OF  THE 

UN  IVLR.SITY 
Of  ILLINOIS 


33T06 

MS^h 

IS63 

v.  6 


lumber 


Shelf  Number 


®aoa 


Presented  by. 
Received  


. 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2015 


https://archive.org/details/historyofromansu06meri 


HISTORY 

OF 

R OMAR  S 

UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 

BY 

CHARLES  lERIVALE,  B.D., 

LATE  FELLOW  OF  ST.  JOHN’S  COLLEGE,  CAMBRIDGE. 

FROM  THE  FOURTH  LONDON  EDITION. 

WITH  A COPIOUS  ANALYTICAL  INDEX. 

YOL.  YI. 


T H 


NEW  YORK: 

D.  APPLETON  AND  COMPANY, 

443  & 445  BROADWAY. 

1865. 


w 

■Jj 

U-- 


?37,  ob 

(Y\ 

}%bl 

Y.  k 


I ■ 

CONTENTS 

OF  THE  SIXTH  VOLUME. 


CHAPTER  Li 

The  wise  and  liberal  policy  of  Claudius  towards  Gaul.— His  measures  for  the  suppression 
of  Druidism. — He  gives  a king  to  the  Cheruscans  and  withdraws  the  Eoman  armies 
from  Germany. — Political  state  of  Britain. — Invaded  by  Aulus  Plautius  (a.  tt.  796, 
a.  d.  43).— Arrival  of  Claudius.— Defeat  of  the  Trinobantes. — Further  successes  of 
Plautius  and  Vespasian.— Subjugation  of  Southern  Britain. — Campaigns  of  Ostorius 
Scapula  against  Caractacus  and  the  Silures. — Foundation  of  the  Colonia  Camulodu 
num  (a.  tr.  804,  a.  d.  51).— Final  defeat  and  capture  of  Caractacus. — Magnanimity  of 
Claudius. — Account  of  the  Eoman  province  of  Britain,  and  the  stations  of  the  legions. 
— Suetonius  Paullinus  routs  the  Britons  in  Anglesey. — Insurrection  of  the  Iceni  un- 
der their  Queen  Boadicea. — Camulodunum  stormed  and  destroyed.— Slaughter  of  the 
Eomans  and  overthrow  of  their  establishments. — Eeturn  of  Suetonius  from  Anglesey, 
and  defeat  of  the  Iceni  (a.  tr.  814,  A.  n.  61). — Final  pacification  of  Southern  Britain. 

Page  7 

CHAPTER  Ln. 

The  family  of  the  Domitii.— Early  years  of  Hero  — His  education  under  Seneca.— Struggle 
for  influence  over  him  between  the  senate,  his  tutor,  and  his  mother. — He  makes  a fa- 
vourable impression  at  the  commencement  of  his  reign. — His  intrigue  with  Acte  and 
gradual  progress  in  vice. — Behaviour  of  Agrippina  and  Seneca.— Praise  of  his  clem- 
ency.—Disgrace  of  Pallas. — Murder  of  Britannicus. — Division  between  Hero  and 
Agrippina. — Intrigues  against  her. — Consecration  of  a temple  to  Claudius, — Favoura- 
ble characteristics  of  Hero’s  early  government. — His  financial  and  legislative  meas- 
ures.—The  “ Quinquennium  Heronis.”  (a.  d.  54-59,  a.  tt.  807-812)  . . 52 


CHAPTER  Lin. 

Hero’s  passion  for  Poppse  Sabina. — Intrigues  against  Agrippina. — Hero’s  machinations 
against  her  unsuccessful.— She  is  finally  despatched  by  his  orders.— Seneca  and  Burr, 
hus  implicated  in  the  murder. — Institution  of  the  Heronian  games. — The  Ludi  Max- 


4 


CONTENTS. 


imi— Nero’s  insensibility  to  national  feeling. — Moderation  in  regard  to  charges  of  libel 
and  majesty. — Death  of  Burrhus. — Seneca  seeks  to  withdraw  from  public  life. — Bise 
and  influence  of  Tigellinus. — Death  of  Plautus  and  Sulla. — Nero’s  extravagance  and 
cruelty. — Repudiation,  banishment,  and  death  of  Octavia. — Prosecution  of  wealthy 
freedmen,  Doryphorus  and  Pallas.— Nero’s  progress  in  licentiousness. — He  exhibits 
himself  in  the  circus. — His  infamous  debauchery. — Burning  of  Rome.— Persecution 
of  the  Christians. — Restoration  of  the  city.— Nero’s  “ Golden  House.” — Further  ex- 
actions and  confiscations. — Conspiracy  of  Piso. — Its  detection  and  punishment.— Death 
of  Lucan  and  Seneca.— Pretended  discovery  of  the  treasures  of  Dido.— Death  of  Pop- 
paea. — Further  prosecutions. — Storms  and  pestilence. — Reflections  of  Tacitus. — Death 
of  Annaeus  Mela.— Prosecution  and  death  of  Soranus  and  Thrasea. — (a.  d.  58-66, 
A.  tr.  811-819) Page  95 


CHAPTER  LIY. 

Consideration  of  the  causes  which  induced  the  Romans  to  endure  the  tyranny  of  the  em- 
perors.— Freedom  of  thought  and  education  allowed  by  it  accepted  as  a compensation 
for  restraints  on  political  action. — Toleration  of  philosophy. — Opposition  of  the  Stoics 
to  the  government : their  character  and  position  in  the  commonwealth. — State  of  re- 
ligion at  Rome : suppression  of  the  Gaulish  superstitions : encroachment  of  Oriental 
cults. — Proscription  of  the  Syrian  and  Egyptian  priesthoods. — Judaism  becomes  fash- 
ionable at  Rome : introduced  among  the  freedmen  of  the  palace. — Turbulence  and 
proscription  of  the  Jews  at  Rome.— First  reception  of  Christian  ideas  among  them. — 
St.  Paul’s  Epistle  to  the  Romans. — His  arrival  and  preaching  at  Rome. — Persecution 
of  the  Christians.— Question  of  the  application  of  this  name  by  Tacitus. — The  tyranny 
of  the  emperors  supported  by  the  corruption  of  the  age. — Reflections  on  Roman  vice. 
— Counteracting  principles  of  virtue. — Christianity  accords  with  the  moral  tendencies 
of  the  age.— Seneca  and  St.  Paul.— The  teaching  of  Seneca  moral,  not  political. — Per- 
sius  and  Lucan  .........  174 


CHAPTER  LV. 

The  Emperor  Nero : his  figure  and  character. — The  senate : reduced  in  numbers  by  pro- 
scription ; lowered  in  estimation : impoverishment  of  the  old  families,  but  general  in- 
crease of  wealth  in  the  upper  ranks.— The  commonalty  divided  into  two  classes. — The 
provincials : the  praetorians : the  legions.— Independence  of  the  proconsuls. — Account 
of  the  government  of  Syria. — Exploits  of  Corbulo.— Nero  visits  Greece : his  personal 
displays  there. — Death  of  Corbulo. — Indignation  of  the  Romans  at  Nero’s  self-abase- 
ment.— Yindex  conspires  against  him. — Revolt  of  Galba  and  Yirginius. — Galba  pro- 
claimed emperor  by  his  soldiers. — Nero’s  return  to  Rome  and  triumphal  entry. — His 
despicable  pusillanimitv.— His  last  hours  and  death.— (a.  d.  66-68,  a.  it.  819-821.)  245 


CHAPTER  LYI. 

The  senate  accepts  Galba  as  emperor. — His  vigour  and  severity. — State  of  the  provinces 
and  the  legions. — Galba  adopts  Piso  as  his  colleague,  and  submits  his  choice  first  to 
the  soldiers  and  afterwards  to  the  senate. — Punishment  of  Nero’s  favourites. — Otho 
intrigues  for  the  empire,  and  is  carried  by  the  soldiers  into  the  praetorian  camp  and1 


CONTENTS. 


5 


proclaimed  emperor.— Galba  goes  forth  to  meet  the  mutineers,  and  is  assassinated,  to- 
gether with  Piso. — His  character  as  emperor. — Otho  succeeds,  and  is  threatened  with 
the  rivalry  of  Yitellius. — Revolt  of  the  legions  of  Gaul. — Yitellius,  proclaimed  em- 
peror, advances  towards  Italy. — Uneasy  position  of  Otho.— He  puts  himself  at  the 
head  of  his  troops,  and  marches  to  Placentia. — Campaign  in  the  Cisalpine.— Battle  of 
Bedriacum. — Defeat  of  the  Othonians. — Otho  kills  himself.— Yirginius  refuses  the 
empire.— The  senate  accepts  Yitellius. — His  gluttony,  selfishness,  and  barbarity.— 
Italy  plundered  by  his  soldiers. — He  is  with  difficulty  dissuaded  from  entering  Rome 
in  arms  as  a conqueror.— (a.  d.  68,  69,  A.  v.  821,  822)  ....  Page  291 


CHAPTER  LYII. 

Origin  and  early  history  of  Yespasian. — He  is  recommended  to  the  Syrian  legions  by  Mu- 
cianus,  and  proclaimed  emperor  in  the  East. — Mucianus  advances  towards  Italy, 
while  Yespasian  occupies  Egypt. — Disgraceful  conduct  of  Yitellius  at  Rome. — He  is 
abandoned  or  feebly  supported  by  his  partisans. — His  forces  defeated  at  Bedriacum. — 
Antonius  Primus  crosses  the  Apennines. — Yitellius  offers  to  resign  the  empire,  but  is 
prevented  by  his  soldiers. — The  Capitol  attacked  by  the  Yitellians  and  burnt. — Primus 
forces  his  way  into  Rome. — Yitellius  seized  and  slain. — Yespasian  accepted  as  em- 
peror.— Mucianus  conducts  the  government  during  his  absence. — State  of  affairs  at 
Rome. — Commencement  of  the  restoration  of  the  Capitol.— Superstitious  reverence 
paid  to  the  Elavian  family.— Pretended  miracles  of  Yespasian  at  Alexandria.— He 
reaches  Rome.— (a.  d.  69,  70,  A.  tt.  822,  823)  ......  346 


CHAPTER  LVIII. 

Revolts  in  the  provinces : The  North-west. — Claudius  Civilis,  under  pretence  of  siding 
with  Yespasian,  intrigues  for  the  subversion  of  the  Roman  power  on  the  Rhine. — 
Critical  state  of  the  legions,  the  auxiliaries,  and  the  province. — Disasters  to  the  Ro- 
man arms. — Civilis  besieges  the  Roman  station  of  Yetera. — Mutiny  among  the  legion- 
aries.— Slaughter  of  their  general  and  dissolution  of  their  forces. — Triumphant  ex- 
pectations of  a Gallo-German  empire. — Capitulation  and  massacre  of  the  garrison  of 
Yetera. — Movement  of  the  Elavian  chiefs  for  the  recovery  of  the  province. — Cam- 
paign of  Cerialis,  and  defeat  of  Civilis. — Gradual  suppression  of  the  revolt  and  sub- 
mission of  Civilis.— Story  of  Julius  Sabinus,  and  final  pacification  of  Gaul.— (a.  d.  69, 
70,  a.  tt.  822,823) 384 


CHAPTER  LIX. 

Maturity  of  the  Jewish  nation : its  material  prosperity : discontent  with  its  position. — 
Resistance  of  brigands  or  false  Christs. — Tumults  in  Jerusalem  controlled  by  the  San- 
hedrim.—Insurrection  in  Galilee  quelled  (a.  d.  52). — Eelix,  governor  of  Judea. — 
Agrippa  a spy  on  the  Jews. — Insurrection  and  defeat  of  Cestius  Gallus  (a.  d.  66). — 
Yespasian  takes  the  command.— Jewish  factions : the  Moderates  and  the  Zealots. — 
Josephus  the  historian  commands  in  Galilee. — His  defence  of  Jotapata  (a.  d.  67). — 
He  is  taken,  and  attaches  himself  to  the  Romans. — Reduction  of  Galilee. — Second 
campaign  (a.  d.  68).— Reduction  of  Persea.— Suspension  of  hostilities  (a.  d.  69). — 
Account  of  the  Jews  by  Tacitus : his  illiberal  disparagement  of  them. — Revolution 


6 


CONTENTS. 


in  Jerusalem.— Overthrow  of  the  Moderate  party— The  three  chiefs  of  the  Zealots, 
John,  Simon,  and  Eleazar,  and  strife  between  them, — Topography  of  Jerusalem. — 
Titus  commences  the  siege  (a.  d.  70). — The  first  wall  stormed. — Koman  circumvalla- 
tion.— Famine  and  portents.— Escape  of  the  Christians.— Capture  of  the  citadel.— 
Storming  of  the  Temple. — Burning  of  the  Holy  of  Holies. — Feeble  defence  of  the 
Upper  ’City.— Destruction  of  Jerusalem. — Capture  of  the  Jewish  chiefs.— Final  re- 
duction of  Judea.— Massacres  and  confiscations.— Titus  returns  to  Eome. — Triumph 
over  Judea. — The  arch  of  Titus. — (a.  d.  44-70,  a.  u.  797-823)  . . Page  415 


Sketch  of  the 

PLAN 

ANCIENT  JERUSALEM 

Scale  of  Yards. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


UNDER  TEE  EMPIRE. 


CHAPTER  LI. 


THE  WISE  AND  LIBERAL  POLICY  OP  CLAUDIUS  TOWARDS  GAUL. — HIS  MEASURES 
FOR  THE  SUPPRESSION  OP  DRUIDISM. — HE  GIVES  A KING  TO  THE  CHERUSCANS 
AND  WITHDRAWS  THE  ROMAN  ARMIES  PROM  GERMANY. — POLITICAL  STATE  OP 
BRITAIN. — INVADED  BY  AULUS  PLAUTIUS  (a.  U.  *796.  A.  D.  43.). — ARRIVAL  OP 
CLAUDIUS. — DEFEAT  OP  THE  TRINOBANTES.— FURTHER  SUCCESSES  OP  PLAUTIUS 
AND  VESPASIAN. — SUBJUGATION  OP  SOUTHERN  BRITAIN. — CAMPAIGNS  OP  OS- 
TORIUS  SCAPULA  AGAINST  CARACTACUS  AND  THE  SILURES. — FOUNDATION  OF 
THE  COLONIA  CAMULODUNUM  (A.  U.  804.  A.  D.  51.). — PINAL  DEFEAT  AND  CAP- 
TURE OP  CARACTACUS. — MAGNANIMITY  OP  CLAUDIUS. — ACCOUNT  OP  THE  RO- 
MAN PROVINCE  OP  BRITAIN,  AND  THE  STATIONS  OP  THE  LEGIONS. — SUETONIUS 
PAULLINUS  ROUTS  THE  BRITONS  IN  ANGLESEY. — INSURRECTION  OP  THE  ICENI 
UNDER  THEIR  QUEEN  BOADICEA. — CAMULODUNUM  STORMED  AND  DESTROYED.— 
SLAUGHTER  OP  THE  ROMANS  AND  OVERTHROW  OP  THEIR  ESTABLISHMENTS.— 
RETURN  OP  SUETONIUS  PROM  ANGLESEY,  AND  DEFEAT  OP  THE  ICENI  (a.  U.  814. 
A.  D.  61.). — PINAL  PACIFICATION  OP  SOUTHERN  BRITAIN. 


EFORE  comparing  with  the  event  the  presage  of  onr 


sanguine  philosopher,  we  will  briefly  dwell  on  that 
episode  in  the  history  of  Claudius,  which  is  to  English 
readers  the  most  interesting  in  his  reign,  the  invasion  and 
conquest  of  southern  Britain.  If  this  emperor’s  disposition 
was  cautious  rather  than  enterprising,  his  military  policy 
was  crowned  everywhere  with  solid  success : while  in  this 
island  his  own  exploits,  no  less  than  those  of  his  lieutenants, 


8 


HISTORY  OP  THE  ROMANS 


were  bold  and  brilliant,  and  reflect  .lustre  on  his  administra- 
tion from  the  remotest  corner  of  the  Roman  world. 

Claudius,  indeed , whenever  he  directly  copied  the  example 
of  Augustus,  approached  nearest  to  the  character  of  a dis- 
claims by  creet  and  able  sovereign.  When  he  placed  him- 
birth  a Gaul.  seif5  as  it  were,  in  the  capital  of  Gaul,  and  traced 
from  that  centre  the  lines  of  his  policy  on  the  frontiers,  he 
best  fulfilled  the  prescriptive  functions  which  every  Roman 
attached  to  the  idea  of  the  Imperator.  Born  at  Lugdunum, 
on  the  day  when  the  divinity  of  Augustus  was  proclaimed 
officially  in  the  province,  the  child  of  the  conqueror  of  the 
Germans  and  the  chief  and  patron  of  the  Gauls,  Claudius 
might  himself  deserve  the  appellation  of  Gaul  almost  as  much 
as  of  Roman.1  It  was  on  this,  his  native  soil,  that  he  ever 
felt  himself  strongest.  Gaul  was  the  standing-point  whence 
he  loved  to  survey  the  empire ; whence  he  derived  his  happi- 
est inspirations ; whence  he  directed  his  most  successful  meas- 
ures, pacific  or  military.  It  was  from  the  colony  of  Lugdunum 
that  he  extended  his  views  to  the  incorporation  of  the  Gaulish 
with  the  Roman  people ; from  Lugdunum  that  he  cast  his 
mental  vision  across  the  Rhine  on  the  one  hand  and  the 
British  Channel  on  the  other,  and  resolved  to  secure  both 
these  frontiers  of  the  empire  by  vigorous  aggressions  upon 
the  regions  beyond  them.  The  Cock,  or  Gaul,  says  Seneca, 
using  a play  on  words  which  eighteen  centuries  have  rendered 
venerable,  was  bravest  on  his  own  dunghill.2  But  this  jest, 
intended  as  a bitter  sarcasm,  expressed  a sober  truth.  What- 
ever were  his  personal  failings,  the  character  of  Claudius  as 
a Roman  emperor,  representing  the  principle  of  civilization 
by  conquest,  is  redeemed  by  the  bold  and  intelligent  spirit 
of  his  Gaulish  policy. 


1 Suet.  Claud.  2. : “ Lugduni,  eo  ipso  die  quo  primurn  ara  ibi  Augusto  dedi- 
cata  est.” 

2 Senec.  Apocol.  7. : “ Galium  in  suo  sterquilinio  plurimum  posse.”  The 
proverb  seems  to  have  been  ancient  even  in  the  time  of  Seneca.  But  the  sat- 
irist identifies  him  still  further  with  the  land  of  his  nativity : “ As  might  be 
expected  of  a Gaul,”  he  says,  “ Claudius  spoiled  Rome.” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


9 


We  have  already  remarked  the  liberal  measures  which 
Claudius  adopted  for  gradually  amalgamating  the  nations 
hevond  the  Alps  with  their  southern  conquerors. 

J 1 _ _ , His  liberal  pol- 

On  a people  so  impulsive  as  the  Cauls,  these  icy  towards  tbe 
measures  exercised,  no  doubt,  a soothing  influence, 
while  they  moulded  their  habits  in  the  prescribed  direction. 
The  men  who  were  proud  to  fight  under  one  Caesar,  were 
assuredly  not  less  pleased  with  admission  to  the  seriate  by 
another.  It  would  be  gratifying,  indeed,  could  we  feel  war- 
ranted in  accepting  as  a sober  truth  the  sneer  of  Seneca,  that 
Claudius  really  meant  to  extend  his  boon  of  citizenship  to 
other  nations  besides  the  Gauls  ; that  he  proposed  to  be  the 
patron  of  the  Germans,  the  Britons,  the  Iberians,  and  the 
Africans : we  should  rejoice  to  have  solid  ground  for  as- 
cribing to  him  a broad  and  general  view  for  the  reformation 
of  the  Roman  polity,  the  extinction  of  the  Italian  municipium 
in  the  empire  of  the  world,  rather  than  a mere  act  of  bounty 
towards  a single  favoured  people.  But  of  this  we  have  no 
distinct  evidence.  All  we  can  say  with  certainty  is  that  he 
threw  open  the  gates  of  Rome  to  the  inhabitants  of  Gaul,  and 
applied  the  principles  of  the  first  Caesar  with  the  frankness 
not  unworthy  of  that  bold  emancipator.  If  it  were  not  the 
first  stej)  taken  by  the  emperors  in  that  happy  direction, 
neither,  it  was  evident,  could  it  be  the  last. 

Claudius,  however,  it  may  be  affirmed  with  certainty,  had  a 
special  motive  besides  personal  partiality  for  this  favour  to 
the  Gauls.  No  people  within  the  circuit  of 

. . . . * Disgust  and 

Roman  dominion  more  required  at  this  moment  suspicion  with 
to  be  conciliated;  none  held  within  its  bosom  mans  regarded 
such  dangerous  elements  of  disaffection.  Under  rm  lsm‘ 
Tiberius  a serious  revolt  had  been  quelled  by  a statesman’s 
firm  resolution.  Under  Caius  the  germ  of  a civil  war  had 
been  extinguished,  as  it  appears,  by  the  happy  boldness  of  a 
madman.  But  whenever  disturbances  should  again  arise, 
whether  from  discontent  among  the  natives,  or  from  the 
irregular  ambition  of  a Roman  official,  there  existed  in  the 
deep-rooted  influence  of  the  Druids,  and  the  wide  ramifica- 


10 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


tions  of  their  system,  still  alive  though  proscribed  and 
persecuted,  the  seeds  of  a violent  outbreak  of  Celtic  nation- 
ality. With  the  scanty  knowledge  we  possess  of  the  real 
character  and  history  of  Druidism,  we  have  no  means  of 
testing  the  vague  notions  entertained  by  the  Romans  them- 
selves of  the  extent  to  which  its  authority  prevailed.  If 
indeed  we  may  believe  their  representations,  this  singular 
form  of  priestcraft  was  recognised  at  this  period  throughout 
wider  regions  than  perhaps  any  other  creed  of  Paganism. 
Its  centre  was  in  the  north  of  Gaul,  at  Dreux,  or  Chartres,  or 
Autun ; but  its  most  illustrious  fanes  were  to  be  sought  on  the 
coasts  of  Britanny,  in  the  sacred  islands  off  the  mouth  of  the 
Loire;  in  the  temples  of  Stonehenge  or  Abury  in  our  own  coun- 
try ; in  the  Isle  of  Anglesey  and  possibly  also  of  Man.1 2  From 
the  shores  of  the  Gulf  of  Lyons  to  the  Firth  of  Clyde  a common 
system  of  usage  and  ceremonial  attested  the  identity  of  the 
Druidism  of  the  Gauls  and  Britons.  It  was  among  the  Britons, 
indeed,  as  we  are  told,  that  the  system  was  taught  in  its  greatest 
purity  ; and  such  was  the  facility  of  communication  between 
the  two  great  members  of  the  Celtic  family,  that  the  youth 
of  Gaul  constantly  crossed  the  Channel  to  seek  the  highest 
instruction  in  its  tenets.  In  Gaul  the  Roman  ruler  sought  to 
modify  and  control  this  dangerous  antagonist  by  assuring 
the  natives  that  their  religion  was  merely  another  form  of 
the  Greek  and  Italian  polytheism : 3 to  them  Druidism  was 
officially  declared  to  be  a special  modification  of  truths 

1 The  silence  of  the  Roman  authorities  on  Stonehenge  and  the  other  pre- 
sumed Druidical  monuments  of  Britain  is  no  doubt  remarkable;  yet  it  seems 
extravagant  to  suppose,  with  some  modem  theorists,  that  they  are  posterior  to 
the  Roman  period.  They  are  first  referred  to  by  Henry  of  Huntingdon,  early 
in  the  twelfth  century,  as  then  of  unfathomed  antiquity,  and  they  form,  un- 
questionably, part  of  a common  system  of  monumental  structures,  scattered 
from  Camac  in  Britanny  through  a great  part  of  northern  and  central  Europe. 

2 Lucan,  i.  450. : — 

“ Et  vos  barbaricos  ritus  moremque  sinistrum 
Sacrorum,  Druidse,  positis  repetistis  ab  armis: 

Solis  nosse  Deos  et  coeli  numina  vobis, 

Aut  solis  nescire  datum  est” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


11 


common  to  the  wisest  and  most  advanced  nations  of  antiquity. 
But  the  fear  with  which  he  really  regarded  it,  as  an  implac- 
able enemy,  an  inspired  rival,  was  betrayed  by  the  dark 
colours  he  allowed  to  be  thrown  over  it  at  home.  The 
bondage  in  which  it  kept  the  minds  of  its  devotees,  the 
atrocity  of  its  human  sacrifices,  the  daring  falsehood  of  its 
promise  of  immortality,  were  exposed  to  the  disgust  and 
contempt  of  the  votaries  of  Olympus.  Its  rites  were  barbar- 
ous ; its  ceremonies  were  sinister  and  gloomy.  The  priests 
alone,  it  was  averred,  pretended  in  their  pride  to  the  occult 
science  which  apprehends,  or  rather  misapprehends,  the 
Gods.1  The  horrors  of  the  sacred  groves,  on  which  no  birds 
alighted,  in  which  no  breezes  rustled,  their  scarred  and  leafless 
trunks,  their  bloody  altar  stumps,  the  dripping  of  their  black 
fountains,  the  mutterings  of  their  riven  caves,  the  ghastly 
visages  of  their  shapeless  idols,  were  enhanced  with  all  the 
art  of  poetic  colouring,  and  contrasted  with  the  graceful 
forms  of  Nymphs  and  Dryads  in  their  fair  retreats,  with  the 
frank  and  cheerful  character  of  the  southern  religions,  the 
faith  of  innocence,  mirth,  and  trust.  Amidst  the  importunate 
doubts  and  fears  regarding  the  future,  or  rather  in  the  despair 
of  another  life  which  Paganism  now  generally  acknowledged, 
the  Roman  was  exasperated  at  the  Druid’s  assertion  of  the 
transmigration  of  souls.  Yet  happy , he  exclaimed  in  the 
bitterness  of  his  spirit,  were  the  Gauls  and  Britons  in  their 
error , insensible  as  it  made  them  to  the  greatest  of  all  fears , 
the  fear  of  death : in  this  faith  they  rushed  gaily  andreck- 

1 Lucan,  iii.  399. : — 

“ Lucus  erat  longo  nunquam  violatus  ab  aevo 

Hunc  non  ruricolae  Panes,  nemorumque  potentes 
Sylvani  Nymphaeque  tenent : sed  barbara  ritu 
Sacra  deum,  structae  sacris  feralibus  arae, 

Omnis  et  humanis  lustrata  cruoribus  arbos 

Hlis  et  volucres  metuunt  insistere  ramis 
Et  lustris  recubare  ferae ; nec  ventus  in  illas 

Incubuit  sylvas Turn  plurima  nigris 

Fontibus  unda  cadit Jam  fama  ferebat 

Saepe  cavas  motu  terrae  mugire  cavemas 


12 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


lessly  on  the  sword  ; their  generous  souls  disdaining  to  spare 
the  life  that  would  so  soon  revive.1 

Augustus,  at  the  same  time  that  he  offered  his  own  di- 
vinity as  an  object  of  worship  to  the  Gauls  at  Lugdunum, 
Proscription  of  had  forbidden  the  exercise  of  Druidical  rites  in 

Druidism  by 

Augustus,  Ti-  Rome.  Henceforth  the  fierce  and  gloomy  super- 
berius,  and  . . ^ . . A 

Claudius.  stition  oi  the  North  was  branded  as  impious  and 

immoral,  hurtful  to  the  manners  of  the  citizens  who  might  be 
tempted  to  mingle  in  it,  and  even  to  the  public  safety.  But 
Augustus  had  not  ventured  to  prohibit  the  natives  of  the 
transalpine  provinces  from  using  their  ancient  rights  on  their 
own  soil.  Tiberius  seems  to  have  pressed  on  the  hostile  sys- 
tem with  a still  stronger  hand : the  revolt  of  the  iEduans  and 
of  Sacrovir,  who,  as  we  have  seen,  was  probably  himself  a 
Druid,  may  have  exasperated  his  enmity.8  It  was  reserved, 
however,  for  Claudius  to  decree  its  entire  abolition,  and  to 
enforce  with  severity  the  edict  of  proscription.  Of  the  meas- 
ures, indeed,  which  he  took,  and  the  details  of  his  persecu- 
tion, we  have  no  information : a single  anecdote  preserved  by 
Pliny  seems  to  show  that,  in  Rome,  at  least  it  was  searching 
and  sanguinary.  A Gaulish  chief,  he  tells  us,  a Yocontian 
of  the  Narbonensis,  who  had  obtained  Roman  knighthood, 
was  delivered  to  the  executioner  because  on  his  coming  to 
Rome  on  private  business,  the  Druid’s  talisman  called  the 
serpent’s  egg  was  discovered  upon  his  person.8  The  jealousy 

1 Lucan,  i.  460. : — 

“ Felices  errore  suo  quos  ille  timorum 
Maximus  haud  urget  leti  metus : inde  ruendi 
In  ferrum  mens  prona  viris,  animseque  capaces 
Mortis,  et  ignavum  reditura  parcere  vitae.” 

2 Plin.  Hist.  Hat.  xxx.  4. : “ Tiberii  Csesaris  principatus  sustulit  Druidas, 
et  hoc  genus  vatum  medicorumque.”  Some  have  supposed  that  Pliny  has 
made  a mistake,  or  that  he  means  Tiberius  Claudius : it  seems  more  likely  that 
he  refers  to  a partial  proscription  of  Druidism  by  the  successor  of  Augustus. 
Strabo  (iv.  4.  p.  198.)  had  spoken  under  the  second  principate  of  the  diligence 
of  the  Romans  in  abolishing  the  worst  atrocities  of  the  Celtic  cults. 

8 Plin.  Hist.  Hat.  xxix.  3.  The  serpent’s  egg  (ovum  anguinum)  seems  to 
have  been  an  echinite  or  other  fossil  substance,  to  which  the  Druids  ascribed  a 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


13 


of  the  government  and  the  curious  interest  of  the  people,  were 
most  excited,  perhaps,  by  the  magical  powers  claimed  by  the 
priests  of  Gaul,  and  the  prophetic  pretensions  of  its  bards. 

While  these  harsh  measures  for  crushing  the  national 
spirit  of  the  Gauls,  and  extirpating  their  leaders,  were  in 
course  of  execution,  the  Roman  government  was 

, , _ Claudius  gives 

not  less  anxious  to  advance  the  eagles  beyond  a king  to  the 

_ , . _ , Cheruscons. 

their  frontiers,  and  to  remove  from  their  borders 
the  dangerous  spectacle  of  freedom.  On  the  side  of  Germany, 
indeed,  the  dominion  of  the  conquerors  had  long  been  pre- 
pared by  artifice  more  sure  than  arms.  After  the  execution 
of  Gsstulicus,  the  legions,  which  he  had  debauched,  had  been 
exercised  by  his  successor,  Galba,  in  some  desultory  oper- 
ations against  the  Chatti;  but  generally  the  peace  of  the 
frontiers  had  been  preserved,  while  the  Germans  were  rapid- 
ly assimilating  themselves  to  the  manners  of  their  more 
powerful  and  civilized  neighbours.  Since  the  death  of  Ar- 
minius,  the  Cheruscans,  once  so  formidable,  had  been  greatly 
enfeebled  by  internal  anarchy.  At  length,  unable  to  govern 
themselves,  they  solicited  a chief  from  the  emperor.  The 
son  of  Flavius,  the  brother  of  Arminius,  had  been  educated  at 
Rome,  in  the  civilization  of  the  South,  with  a view,  no  doubt, 
to  future  service.  The  Cheruscans  were  willing  to  accept  a 
kinsman  of  their  late  hero : Claudius  seized  the  opportunity 
for  advancing  his  own  views ; and  the  youth  went  forth  from 
the  school  of  monarchy,  the  first  foreigner,  as  the  emperor 
reminded  him,  who,  bom  at  Rome,  a citizen  and  not  a cap- 
tive or  a hostage,  had  been  raised  by  Roman  hands  to  an 
independent  sovereignty.  Italicus,  such  was  the  name  the 
German  adopted,  had  been  trained  to  the  skilful  use  both  of 
the  Roman  and  the  German  weapons ; beneath  the  varnish 
of  Italian  cultivation  he  retained  some  also  of  the  coarse 
tastes  of  his  ancient  countrymen ; and  he  seems  to  have  pos- 
sessed popular  manners,  which  for  a time  ingratiated  him 
with  the  jealous  barbarians.  But  presently  offence  was 

mysterious  origin,  and  not  less  mysterious  virtues.  It  was  worn  round  the 
neck  as  an  amulet. 


14 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


given ; suspicions  and  enmities  arose ; tlie  charge  of  Roman 
manners  was  promptly  made  against  him,  and  connected 
with  the  imputation  of  foreign  inclinations,  and  a disposition 
to  sacrifice  to  the  stranger  the  weal  of  the  fatherland.  It 
was  in  vain,  urged  his  enemies,  that  he  boasted  himself  the 
nephew  of  Arminius  the  patriot : was  he  not  the  son  of  Fla- 
vius the  renegade?  Italicus,  on  the  other  hand,  reminded 
the  disaffected  that  he  had  come  among  them  at  their  own 
invitation,  and  challenged  his  enemies  to  decide  by  arms 
whether  he  deserved  by  his  prowess  to  claim  kinship  with 
their  bravest  champion.  He  succeeded,  after  some  vicissi- 
tudes, in  putting  down  the  open  attempts  to  unseat  him; 
but  the  Cheruscans  continued,  under  his  rule,  to  be  disturbed 
by  dissensions,  to  the  advantage  of  the  Romans,  who  looked 
on  complacently,  and  abstained  from  interfering.1 

Meanwhile  the  Chauci,  who  had  formed  a closer  con- 
nexion with  Rome,  and  had  profited  for  many  years  by  their 
Campaign  of  sta^e  °f  peaceful  dependence,  which  gave  an 
Corbuio  in  Ger-  opening  to  their  commerce  with  Gaul  and  Brit- 

many.  . ^ ....  _ 

am,  had  ventured,  at  the  instigation  ot  a pirati- 
cal chief  named  Gennascus,  to  seek  plunder  by  incursions 
into  the  lower  German  province.  Sanquinius,  the  com- 
mander in  this  quarter,  had  recently  died,  and  the  defence 
of  the  district  was  for  a time  neglected.  This  man  was  suc- 
ceeded, however,  by  Domitius  Corbuio,  an  active  and  enter- 
prising soldier,  who  promptly  restored  discipline  in  the  camps, 
repaired  the  flotilla  of  the  Rhine  and  ocean,  and  pursued  the 
depredators  into  all  their  harbours.  He  chastised  the  Frisii, 
who  had  dared  to  withhold  their  stipulated  tribute;  and 
without  actually  annexing  their  country  to  the  Roman  do- 
minions, planted  among  them  a government  of  the  friends 
and  clients  of  the  empire;  supported  by  the  presence  of  a 
military  force.  At  the  same  time  he  sought  to  subdue  the 
Chauci  by  corrupting  some  of  their  chiefs,  and  by  the  murder 
of  Gennascus,  towards  whom,  as  a mere  pirate,  no  terms  of 
honour  need  be  kept.  This  attempt  on  the  outlaw’s  life  was 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xi.  16,  17. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


15 


indeed  successful ; nevertheless,  the  result  was  not  so  propi- 
tious as  Corbulo  had  anticipated.  The  Chauci,  a.d.  47. 
long  wavering  in  their  dependence,  were  decided  800- 

against  Home  by  irritation  at  this  treacherous  dealing,  and 
flew  to  arms  with  frantic  ardour.  Possibly  this  was  what 
Corbulo  desired;  he  had  scattered  with  his  own  hand  the 
seed  of  rebellion,  the  crop  had  ripened,  and  he  was  about  to 
reap  the  harvest.  But  he  had  worse  enemies  at  the  court  of 
Claudius  than  the  Chauci  on  the  Rhine.  He  was  there  rep- 
resented as  seeking  war  for  his  own  aggrandizement.  If  he 
failed,  the  empire  would  suffer ; if  he  triumphed,  the  emperor 
himself  might  find  him  dangerous.  Such  were  the  insinu- 
ations, it  was  alleged,  by  which  the  timid  prince  was  induced 
to  stop  the  progress  of  conquest  in  Germany,  and  recall  his 
standards  behind  the  Rhine.  But  Claudius  doubtless  knew 
that  peace  was  now  a more  effective  auxiliary  than  war ; and 
he  preferred  holding  out  the  hand  of  treacherous  friendship 
to  engaging  in  superfluous  hostilities.  The  order  to  retire 
reached  Corbulo  when  he  was  actually  planting  a camp  in 
the  territory  of  the  Chauci  for  the  site  of  a fortress,  or  a 
colony.  He  read  in  it  the  danger  to  which  he  was  exposed 
from  the  emperor’s  jealousy : the  contempt  in  which  he  should 
be  held  by  the  arrogant  barbarians,  the  mockery  to  which  he 
should  be  subjected  even  from  his  own  allies.  Nevertheless, 
with  the  old  Roman  endurance,  he  stifled  every  sign  of  anger 
or  murmur  of  remonstrance ; and  muttering  only,  how  for- 
tunate were  once  the  Roman  captains , gave  the  signal  for 
retreat.  With  the  withdrawal  of  the  legions,  the  Chauci 
relapsed  into  their  fatal  torpor.  It  was  necessary,  however, 
to  furnish  the  soldiers  with  employment ; and,  forbidden  to 
exercise  them  in  war,  Corbulo  now  engaged  them  in  a great 
work  of  engineering,  which  has  long  outlasted  the  conquests 
of  Rome  beyond  the  Rhine.  He  cut  a canal  from  the  Maas, 
near  its  mouth,  to  the  northern  branch  of  the  Rhine  parallel 
to  the  line  of  coast,  to  effect  an  easy  communication  between 
his  stations,  in  a region  where  the  yielding  soil  could  scarce 
bear  the  weight  of  a military  causeway,  to  drain  at  the  same 


16 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


time  the  lowlands,  and  oppose  dykes  to  the  encroachment  of 
the  ocean.1  Before  the  adoption  of  the  modern  railroad,  the 
canal  of  Corbulo  was  the  common  highway  of  traffic  between 
Rotterdam  and  Leyden;  and  its  plodding  trekschuyt  may 
still  faithfully  represent  the  old  Roman  tow-boat  of  the 
Pomp  tine  marshes.2 

The  religion  of  the  Germans  was  distinct  from  that  of  the 
Gauls ; and  from  this  reason,  perhaps,  as  well  as  from  the  long 
^ „ animosity  between  the  two  nations,  the  Romans 

more  jealous  of  were  less  apprehensive  of  the  effect  which  might 

freedom  in  A A * 

Britain  than  in  be  produced  on  the  one  bank  by  the  view  of  sur- 

Germany.  . . J 

vivmg  independence  on  the  other.  But  with  the 
island  of  Britain,  more  distant  yet  not  remote,  the  case  was 
different.  Though  the  Channel  was  a broader  barrier  than 
the  Rhine,  the  communication  of  ideas,  of  hopes,  fears  and 
enmities,  was  more  close  and  constant  between  the  Gauls  and 
Britons  than  between  the  Gauls  and  Germans.  There  was 
nearer  affinity  in  blood,  language  and  manners ; there  were 
no  recollections  of  mutual  hostility ; no  memorials  on  either 
side  of  conquest  or  encroachment ; above  all,  Druidism  was 
paramount  among  both,  and  the  ministers  of  the  Gallic  rites 
looked  to  the  sacred  recesses  of  the  northern  island  as  the 
real  hearth  and  home  of  their  own  religious  polity.  The 
persecution  of  the  Druids  on  the  continent  drove  them  back 
to  the  spot  where  they  had  imbibed  their  own  mystic  lore ; 
and  the  recital  of  their  wrongs  inflamed  the  indignation  of 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xi.  18-20.  “This  great  work  still  forms  a principal  drain  of 
the  province  of  Holland  between  the  city  of  Leyden  and  the  village  of  Sluys 
on  the  Maas.” — Greenwood,  Hist,  of  the  Germans , i.  141. 

2 Comp.  Horace’s  Journey  to  JBrundisium.  A more  important  work  of  this 
kind  was  projected  about  the  year  812  by  L.  Yetus,  a Roman  commander  in 
northern  Gaul.  He  proposed  to  unite  the  Saone  and  Moselle  by  a canal,  to  ex- 
pedite the  transmission  of  troops  from  the  South;  but  was  dissuaded  from 
the  enterprise  by  iElius  Gracilis,  the  legatus  of  the  Belgic  province,  as  likely 
to  bring  him  into  suspicion  with  the  emperor.  Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  53.  Steininger 
( Gesch.  der  Trevirer , p.  86.)  laments,  that  up  to  this  day  so  useful  a work 
should  have  been  neglected,  though  it  presents  no  great  difficulties. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


17 


the  children  of  that  heroic  race  which  could  boast  that  it  had 
repulsed  the  mighty  Caesar  with  ignominy  from  its  shores.1 2 

The  tribute  which  Julius  Caesar  had  pretended  to  impose 
on  some  chiefs  of  southern  Britain  had  been  rarely  offered, 
and  never  exacted.  Augustus,  we  have  seen,  _ , . 

° 7 . . 7 Relation  of 

had  once  threatened  to  recover  it  m person  by  Britain  with 

. . -tit  ..  the  continent. 

force  of  arms : it  is  possible  that  some  slight  con- 
cessions then  made  to  his  demands  sufficed  to  divert  him 
from  an  enterprise  he  had  no  real  desire  to  undertake.3 * * * 
Under  Tiberius,  the  affairs  of  Britain  excited  no  political 
interest  at  Rome.  But  the  rapid  progress  of  Roman  civil- 
ization in  northern  Gaul,  the  growth  of  the  cities  on  the 
banks  of  the  teeming  Rhine-stream,  the  spread  of  commer- 
cial relations  along  the  shores  of  Belgium,  Holland,  and 
Friesland,  had  elicited  a spirit  of  friendly  intercourse  from 
the  British  side  of  the  ocean.  Londinium,  a city  which 
escaped  the  notice  of  Caesar,  had  become  in  the  time  of 
Claudius  a great  emporium  of  trade.  Camulodunum  was  the 
residence  of  the  chief  potentate  of  southern  Britain ; the  fer- 
tile plains  of  our  eastern  provinces  were  studded  with  numer- 
ous towns  and  villages ; the  vessels  of  the  Thames,  the  Colne, 
and  the  Wensum  reciprocated  traffic  with  those  of  the  Rhine, 
the  Maas,  and  the  Scheldt : the  coinage  of  Cunobelinus,  king 
of  the  Trinobantes,  of  which  specimens  still  exist,  attests,  by 
its  skilful  workmanship  and  its  Latin  legends,  an  intimate 

1 Names,  indeed,  of  Gaulish  tribes,  and  those  possibly  of  German  origin, 
may  be  noticed  in  the  south-eastern  parts  of  Britain,  but  there  is  no  record  of 
a hostile  invasion,  no  allusion  to  hostile  reminiscences ; and  the  existence  of 
Druidical  remains  on  the  very  spots  where  these  tribes  were  seated  speaks  in 
favour  of  their  actual  affinity  to  the  original  stock. 

2 My  attention  has  been  directed  to  a fragment  of  Livy  recently  produced 
by  Schneidewin,  from  which  it  would  appear  that  Augustus  actually  set  foot  in 
Britain : “ Caesar  Augustus  populo  Romano  nuntiat,  regressus  a Britannia  in- 

sula, totum  orbem  terrarum  tarn  bello  quam  amicitia  Romano  imperio  subdi- 

tum.”  The  passage  seems  to  be  a fragment  of  an  epitome,  and  is  probably 
not  strictly  faithful  to  the  sense  of  the  author.  See  The  Christian  Reformer 

for  Jan.  1857,  p.  7.  Suetonius  {Claud.  16.)  and  Eutropius  (vii.  13.)  say  expressly 

that  no  Roman  set  foot  in  Britain  from  Julius  Caesar  to  Claudius. 

VOL.  vi. — 2 


18 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


and  friendly  connexion  between  Britain  and  Gaul,  or  possi- 
bly Italy.1  W e may  conjecture,  that  the  Romans  themselves, 
in  the  interval  since  the  invasion  of  Caesar,  had  settled  as 
traders  on  our  island. 

The  south-eastern  parts  of  Britain  seem  to  have  been  oc- 
cupied at  this  period  by  three  principal  nations,  the  Regni  in 

Sussex,  the  Trinobantes  in  Hertford  and  Essex, 
^southern  the  Iceni  in  Norfolk  and  Suffolk.  The  Trino- 
TrimJbantes!  bantes  were  already  known  as  the  most  power- 

Sei<S,and  fol  the  British  tribes  in  the  time  of  Caesar. 

Their  leader,  Cassivellaunus,  had  assumed  the 
direction  of  a league  against  the  invader.  His  authority  had 
been  still  further  extended  by  his  successors.  If  we  may  be- 
lieve that  the  great  system  of  roads,  to  which  we  give  the 
name  of  British,  was  actually  the  work  of  our  Celtic  ances- 
tors, extending  as  they  do  across  the  length  and  breadth  of 
the  island  from  Richborough  to  the  Menai  Straits,  from  the 
mouth  of  the  Axe  to  the  Wash  and  Humber,  it  would  seem 
to  indicate  that  there  was  once  a time  when  the  whole  of 
South  Britain  at  least  was  subject  to  some  common  authority. 
Of  such  a political  combination,  however,  there  is  certainly 
no  trace  in  history:  possibly  the  union  extended  only  to 
matters  of  religion.2  Cunobelinus  indeed,  the  greatest  of 

1 In  the  time  of  Caesar,  according  to  his  own  account,  the  Britons  had  no 
coinage,  and  used  only  rude  pieces  of  iron  by  weight.  Eckhel  expresses  some 
doubt  of  the  genuineness  of  the  few  British  coins  which  were  known  in  his 
day.  Their  number,  however,  has  now  been  greatly  increased,  and  modem 
numismatists  have  assiduously  collected  and  catalogued  them.  I am  informed 
that  they  are  generally  rather  coarse  imitations  of  Macedonian  types,  derived, 
no  doubt,  from  Gaul  and  Massilia. 

2 Caesar  describes  the  Britons  as  in  a state  of  barbarism,  which  completely 
disappears  in  the  accounts  of  Tacitus  and  Dion.  We  hear  no  more  now  of 
their  painted  bodies,  their  scythed  chariots,  their  hideous  sacrifices,  their  re- 
volting concubinage.  Can  we  suppose  that  Caesar  was  willing  to  represent  the 
country,  which  he  found  it  inconvenient  to  subdue,  as  more  miserable  than  it 
really  was  ? Or  could  the  hundred  years  of  intercourse,  which  had  since  inter- 
vened, with  the  pacified  tribes  of  Gaul  and  Germany,  have  effected  so  remark- 
able a change  ? The  existence  of  a common  system  of  roads  throughout  the 
country,  which  is  admitted  by  some  of  the  best  modern  antiquarians,  seems  a 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


19 


the  descendants  of  Cassivellaunus,  seems  to  have  united  a 
large  part  of  the  island  under  his  control  or  influence.  From 
his  capital  at  Camulodunum,  near  the  mouth  of  the  Colne  in 
Essex,  to  which  he  had  transferred  the  royal  residence  from 
Verulamium,  for  the  advantage  perhaps  of  intercourse  with 
Gaul  and  Germany,  he  extended  his  sway  over  the  south  and 
centre  of  Britain,  and  may  possibly  have  been  recognised  as 
paramount  in  arms  by  the  pure  Celtic  races  on  the  Severn 
and  even  beyond  it.  The  people  of  Kent  and  Sussex  may 
also,  in  some  sense,  have  acknowledged  his  sovereignty. 
But  the  Iceni  were  independent,  jealous,  and  perhaps  hostile 
to  him.  To  this  nation  also  a number  of  petty  tribes  were 
subservient,  extending  across  the  centre  of  the  island  from 
the  Wash  to  the  Avon  and  Severn.  Between  the  Romans 
and  these  proud  and  self-confident  islanders,  causes  of  quar- 
rel were  never  wanting;  it  only  remained  for  the  southern 
conquerors  hovering  on  their  coasts,  and  mingling  in  all  their 
dealings,  to  choose  their  own  moment  for  aggression.  The 
petty  chiefs  who  chanced  to  be  expelled  from  their  own 
country  by  domestic  dissensions,  generally  sought  a refuge, 
which  was  never  denied  them,  within  the  Roman  dominions, 
and  the  kings  of  the  Trinobantes  or  Iceni  sometimes  ventured 
to  demand  that  they  should  be  surrendered.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  fugitives  were  constantly  urging  the  Roman  gov- 
ernment to  restore  them  by  arms  or  influence  to  their  for- 
feited rights  at  home,  and  holding  out  splendid  promises  of 
tribute  and  submission  in  return.  Between  these  two  classes 
of  applicants  the  Romans  would  not  long  hesitate.  When 
Adminius,  one  of  the  sons  of  Cunobelin,  solicited  Cains  to 
to  recover  for  him  his  share  in  the  paternal  inheritance,  the 

strong  proof  of  a common  civilization.  These  lines  of  road  do  not  correspond 
with  the  Roman  Itineraries;  and  some  of  them,  as  those  which  lead  from 
Seaton  to  Yarmouth,  and  from  Southampton  to  Richborough,  do  not  seem  to 
belong  to  a Roman  system.  They  point  to  a native  traffic,  carried  on  by  land 
and  water,  between  Armorica  and  the  Frisian  or  Danish  coasts.  But  if  not 
Roman,  there  is  no  later  period  of  an  united  Britain  to  which  they  can  well  be 
ascribed. 


20 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


emperor  prepared,  as  we  have  seen,  to  enforce  his  claims 
with  a military  demonstration.  The  threatened  invasion 
was,  however,  postponed,  whether  its  ostensible  object  were 
gained  or  not.  Of  Adminius  and  his  pretensions  we  hear  no 
more;  but  other  fugitives  and  other  claimants  soon  appeared 
upon  the  scene. 

The  solicitations  of  Bericus  to  Claudius  were  the  counter- 
part to  those  of  Adminius  to  his  predecessor,  though  of  this 
Claudius  pre-  suppliant  we  know  even  less  than  of  the  former. 
Invasion  of16  But  he  too  was  a chief  expatriated  by  domestic 
Britain.  enemies,  he  too  was  demanded  in  extradition  by 

his  countrymen,  but  retained  by  the  policy  rather  than  the 
compassion  of  the  Romans;  he  too  succeeded  in  getting  a 
Roman  army  equipped  for  his  restoration.1 2 *  Claudius  could 
assert,  like  Augustus  before  him,  that  the  tribute  of  Britain 
had  been  long  withheld.  Like  Augustus,  he  was  determined 
to  chastise  the  defaulters,  and  take  firmer  sureties  than  be- 
fore for  future  submission.  Like  Augustus,  he  proposed  to 
lead  the  eagles  in  person,  to  earn  a title  and  a triumph,  as  his 
ancestors  had  done,  on  the  field  of  battle.  But  he  could  not 
spare  the  time,  he  would  not  perhaps  encounter  the  toil,  re- 
quired for  the  conquest  of  the  powerful  islanders.  Aulus 
' Plautius,  who  held  a high  command  in  Gaul,  was  chosen  to 
conduct  the  invasion,  and  prepare  the  way  for  the  emperor 
a.».  48.  *>y  a preliminary  campaign  in  the  year  of  the 

a.  ir.  796.  city  Y96.  It  was  now  about  a hundred  years 

since  the  epoch  of  Caesar’s  first  descent  on  Britain.  The 
futile  and  almost  ignominious  result  of  that  attempt  was  still 
remembered  among  the  legions  of  the  northern  provinces. 
The  storms  and  shoals  of  the  ocean  had  since  then  caused 
more  than  one  disaster  to  their  arms.  The  inhospitable 
character  of  the  natives  of  either  coast  had  more  than  once 
been  proved,8  and  when  Plautinus  announced  to  his  soldiers 


1 Dion,  lx.  19.  This  Bericus  may  probably  have  been  the  Yeric  of  some 
British  coins. 

2 Hor.  Od.  iii.  3. : “ Yisam  Britannos  hospitibus  feros.”  Yet  the  British 

chiefs  had  sent  back  the  shipwrecked  sailors  of  Germanicus  (Tac.  Ann.  ii.  24.). 


A-  U.  796.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


21 


the  service  they  were  destined  for,  they  revised  to  follow  his 
standards,  and  broke  out  into  murmurs  and  even  mutiny. 
Plautius  reported  the  condition  of  his  camp  to  Rome.  The 
emperor,  bent  on  his  purpose,  determined  to  enforce  disci- 
pline. He  sent  Narcissus  to  the  camp,  to  bring  the  turbulent 
legionaries  to  obedience.  They  received  him  with  cries  of  Io 
Saturnalia ! mocking  the  arrogant  freedman  as  a slave  who 
ventured  to  assume  the  character  of  his  master.  But,  satisfied 
with  their  jest,  they  seem  to  have  returned  at  last  of  their  own 
accord  to  their  duty,  and  submitted  to  their  chief’s  commands. 

Four  legions,  the  Second,  the  Ninth,  the  Fourteenth  and 
the  Twentieth,  all  noted  afterwards  in  British  history,  were 
selected  for  this  distant  adventure.  Plautius,  we  Aalus  piaatiUs 
are  told,  arrayed  his  forces  in  three  divisions,  to  mvades  Bntain* 
which  he  assigned  different  places  of  landing,  in  order  to 
baffle  the  defence,  and  secure  a footing  in  one  quarter,  if  re- 
pulsed in  another.  I shall  have  occasion  to  show  how  little 
reliance  can  be  placed  on  the  details  of  this  expedition, 
meagre  as  they  are,  recorded  by  Dion  only ; we  have,  how- 
ever, no  choice  but  to  relate  them  as  they  have  been  reported, 
and  point  out  their  inconsistency  as  we  proceed.  The  ships 
encountered  adverse  weather,  and  were  more  than  once  driven 
back;  but  the  appearance  of  a meteor  which  shot  from  East 
to  West,  restored  the  courage  of  the  soldiers,  by  following 
the  direction  in  which  they  were  bound.  It  would  seem 
then  that  their  course  lay  from  the  Belgian  roadsteads  on 
either  side  the  Itian  promontory,  to  the  British  above  and 
below  the  South  Foreland ; from  the  ship-builders’  creeks  at 
the  efflux  of  the  Aa  and  the  Liane  to  the  havens  or  low  ac- 
cessible beaches  of  Richborough,  Dover  and  Lymne.  What- 
ever were  the  points  at  which  they  came  to  land,  they  seem 
to  have  encountered  no  resistance.  Soon  afterwards  we  shall 
find  the  Regni  in  friendly  relations  with  the  Romans,  and  it 
is  possible  that  the  invaders  had  already  tampered  with  their 

These  men,  however,  brought  home  a terrific  account  of  the  sea  and  land  mon- 
sters they  had  encountered.  Moreover,  the  poverty  of  the  unclad  islanders 
was  still  remembered  in  the  traditions  of  the  camps. 


22 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


\A.  D.  43. 


fidelity  to  the  common  cause,  and  engaged  their  influence 
over  the  coast  of  Kent  and  Sussex.  It  was  reported,  how- 
ever, that  the  natives  had  been  lulled  into  false  security  by 
the  rumours  sedulously  wafted  from  Gaul  of  the  disaffection 
of  the  legions,  and  neglected  in  consequence  the  measures 
necessary  for  opposing  their  disembarkation.1 

The  sons  of  the  great  Cunobelin,  Caractacus  and  Togo- 
Successes  of  dumnus,  wielded  the  forces  of  the  Trinobantes 
SutemnTves-  anc*-  held  a primacy  of  rank  and  power  among 
pasianus.  the  chiefs  of  South  Britain.  Like  their  ancestor 
Cassivellaun,  and  following  the  usual  tactics  of  their  Ger- 
man neighbours,  they  abstained  from  meeting  the  invader 
in  the  field,  and  ensconced  themselves  in  the  forests,  or 
behind  the  rivers,  where  he  could  only  attack  them  at  a 
disadvantage.  Plautius,  however,  pushed  boldly  forward, 
worsted  both  princes  in  succession,  and  received  the  submis- 
sion of  some  clans  of  the  Boduni,  as  they  are  called  by  Dion, 
the  same,  it  is  generally  supposed,  as  the  Dobuni  of  Ptolemy, 
the  inhabitants  of  modem  Gloucestershire.2  Placing  a gar- 
rison in  this  district,  he  advanced  to  the  banks  of  a broad 
river,  which  the  Britons  deemed  impassable ; but  a squadron 
of  Batavian  cavalry,  trained  to  swim  the  Rhine  and  Wahal, 
dashed  boldly  across  it,  and  dislodged  them  from  their  posi- 
tion by  striking  at  the  horses  which  drew  their  chariots.  A 
force  under  Flavius  Yespasianus  penetrated  into  the  unknown 
regions  beyond,  and  obtained,  not  without  great  hazards, 
some  further  successes.  Such  was  the  command  in  which 
this  brave  and  strenuous  captain  was  first  shown  to  the  Fates , 
which  from  henceforth  destined  him  for  empire.3  His  empire 
and  his  dynasty  soon  passed  away ; but  Providence  designed 
him  for  its  instrument  in  a work  of  wider  and  more  lasting 
interest.  On  the  plains  of  Britain  Vespasian  learnt  the  art 
of  war,  which  he  was  to  practise  among  the  defiles  of  Pales- 
tine, and  against  the  despair  and  fury  of  the  Jews. 

1 Dion,  lx.  19. 

2 Ptol.  Geogr.  ii.  3.  25.  28.  Smith’s  Did.  of  Class.  Geography. 

8 Tac.  Agric.  13.:  “Monstratus  fatis  Yespasianus.” 


A.  U.  796. J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


23 


From  the  mention  of  the  Boduni  or  Dobuni  it  is  natural 
to  suppose  that  the  broad  stream  above  mentioned  was  the 
Severn  near  its  mouth.  Yet  it  is  difficult  to  Not  probable 
imagine  that  Plautius  can  have  advanced  so  far  crossedatheUS 
into  the  country  in  the  few  weeks  since  his  land-  Severn* 
ing,  and  the  language  of  Dion  seems  presently  to  contradict 
it.  The  defeated  Britons,  says  this  writer,  retired  to  the 
Thames,  and  placed  that  river  between  themselves  and  the 
Romans  in  the  lowest  portion  of  its  course,  where  it  swells 
to  a great  breadth  with  the  tidal  waters  of  the  ocean.  The 
invaders,  he  continues,  attempting  to  follow  them,  fell,  in 
their  ignorance  of  the  ground,  into  great  danger : but  again 
the  Batavians  swam  their  horses  across  the  river,  and  the 
barbarians  were  routed  once  more  with  much  slaughter.  In 
this  battle  Togodumnus  was  slain : Caractacus  had  perhaps 
retired  to  the  West,  where  we  shall  meet  with  him  again.  A 
few  only  of  the  Romans  were  lost  in  the  pursuit  among  the 
marshes.1 

Plautius,  it  would  seem,  now  for  the  first  time  firmly 
planted  himself  on  the  north  bank  of  the  Thames.  It  is  im- 
possible to  suppose  that  if  he  had  once  reached 

to  _ -.-.I  . He  awaits  the 

the  Severn,  he  would  have  again  fallen  back  be-  arrival  of  ciau- 

. i.ii  t i -•  dius  on  the 

hind  a barrier  which  he  must  have  already  cross-  North  bank  of 
ed  or  doubled.  Nor,  as  I have  said,  is  there  time 
allowed  for  such  distant  operations.  For  he  now  sent  to 
summon  Claudius  to  pass  over  into  Britain,  and  assist  per- 
sonally in  the  final  reduction  of  the  twice  broken  Trinobantes. 
He  awaited  behind  his  entrenchments  his  chief’s  arrival. 
Claudius  made  his  appearance  before  the  end  of  the  military 
season.  I can  discover  no  river  that  will  answer  the  descrip- 
tion of  the  historian,  except  the  Medway;  and  if  any  reli- 
ance is  to  be  placed  on  the  terms  in  which  Dion  expresses 
himself,  we  must  believe  that  instead  of  traversing  half  the 
island  unopposed,  Plautius  first  met  the  Britons  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood of  Maidstone  or  Rochester.  The  three  divisions 
of  his  army  may  have  converged  from  the  three  most  fre- 

1 Dion,  lx.  20. 


24 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  43. 


quented  of  the  Kentish  ports,  at  Canterbury.  But  it  is  bet- 
ter to  confess  the  impossibility  of  tracing  his  movements. 
Dion  is  throughout  very  indistinct  in  his  conception  of  British 
history  and  geography,  and  when  Tacitus  himself  comes  to 
our  aid,  we  shall  find  his  knowledge  also  slender  and  super- 
ficial. 

Plautius  had  been  instructed  to  call  the  emperor  to  his 
assistance,  if  difficulties  should  occur  that  deserved  his  august 
interference.  The  legatus  was  perhaps  courtier 

Claudius  enters  . . 

Britain  in  per-  enough  to  divine  hlS  master  S Wishes,  and  to  rep- 
son  and  sub-  _ _ „ . ...  ..... 

dues  the  Trino-  resent  the  state  oi  affairs  according  to  his  desire. 

Claudius  held  himself  ready  for  the  expected  sum- 
mons, and  there  can  have  been  no  delay  in  his  reply  to  it. 
Perhaps  he  had  already  gone  forth  to  meet  it.  Leaving  the 
conduct  of  affairs  at  home  to  Vitellius,  his  colleague  in  the 
consulship,  he  proceeded  by  the  route  of  Ostia  and  Massilia, 
attended  by  a retinue  of  officers  and  soldiers,  and  a train  of 
elephants  already  bespoken  for  the  service.  His  resolution 
was  tried  by  adverse  winds,  which  twice  drove  him  back, 
not  without  peril,  from  the  coast  of  Gaul.1  When  at  last  he 
landed,  his  course  was  directed  partly  along  the  military 
roads,  partly  by  the  convenient  channels  of  the  navigable 
rivers,  till  he  reached  the  coasts  of  the  British  sea.  At  Ges- 
soriacum  he  embarked  for  the  opposite  shores  of  Cantium, 
and  speedily  reached  the  legions  in  their  encampment  be- 
yond the  Thames.  The  soldiers,  long  held  in  the  leash  in 
expectation  of  his  arrival,  were  eager  to  spring  upon  the  foe. 
With  the  emperor  himself  at  their  head,  a spectacle  not  be- 
held since  the  days  of  the  valiant  Julius,  they  traversed  the 
level  plains  of  the  Trinobantes,  which  afforded  no  defensible 
position,  till  the  natives  were  compelled  to  stand  at  bay  be- 
fore the  stockades  which  encircled  their  capital  Camulodu- 
num.  It  is  not  perhaps  too  bold  a conjecture  that  the  lines 
which  can  still  be  traced  from  the  Colne  to  a little  wooded 
stream  called  the  Roman  river,  drawn  across  the  approach  to 
a tract  of  twenty  or  thirty  square  miles  surrounded  on  every 
1 Suet.  Claud.  17. 


A.  U.  796.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


25 


other  side  by  water,  indicate  the  ramparts  of  this  British  op- 
pidum.1 *  Within  this  inclosed  space  there  was  ample  room 
not  only  for  the  palace  of  the  chief  and  the  cabins  of  his  peo- 
ple, but  for  the  grazing  land  of  their  flocks  and  herds  in  sea- 
sons of  foreign  attack ; while,  resting  on  the  sea  in  its  rear, 
it  commanded  the  means  of  reinforcement,  and,  if  necessary, 
of  flight.  But  the  fate  of  the  capital  was  decided  by  the  issue 
of  the  encounter  which  took  place  before  it.  The  Trinobantes 
were  routed.  They  surrendered  their  city,  and,  with  it,  their 
national  freedom  and  independence.  The  victory  was  com- 
plete: the  subjection  of  the  enemy  assured:  within  sixteen 
days  from  his  landing  in  Britain,  Claudius  had  broken  a 
powerful  kingdom,  and  accomplished  a substantial  conquest. 
He  left  it  to  Plautius  to  secure  by  the  usual  methods  the 
fruits  of  this  signal  success,  and  returned  himself  immediately 
to  Rome,  from  which  he  had  not  been  absent  more  than  six 
months  altogether.3 * * * * 8 

Claudius  had  gained  a victory : some  indeed  were  found  to 
assert  in  after  times  that  the  foe  had  never  met  him  in  the 
field,  and  had  yielded  city  and  country  without 
a blow : but  his  soldiers  undoubtedly  had  hailed  triumphs  at 
him  repeatedly,  in  the  short  space  of  sixteen  days, 
with  the  title  of  Imperator,  and  he  was  qualified  by  the  pur- 
port of  his  laurelled  despatches  to  claim  the  crowning  honour 

1 These  lines  have  a fosse  traceable  on  their  western  side ; they  were  there- 

fore defences  against  attack  from  the  land,  not  from  the  sea.  At  one  or  two 

points  they  are  strengthened  by  small  rectangular  castella,  which  may  be  later 

Roman  additions ; and  it  is  difficult  to  point  out  any  other  period  of  our  his- 

tory when  the  defence  of  the  little  peninsula  on  which  Colchester  stands  could 

have  given  occasion  to  works  of  this  nature.  It  is  asserted,  moreover,  that 

British  coins  have  been  found  in  these  works. 

8 Dion,  lx.  21.  Suetonius  (Claud.  17.)  declares  that  the  conquest  was 
bloodless  : “ Sine  ullo  prselio  aut  sanguine  intra  paucissimos  dies  parte  insulae 
in  deditionem  recepta  sexto  quam  profectus  erat  mense  Romam  rediit,  triumpha- 
vitque.”  He  evidently  wishes  to  disparage  the  emperor’s  exploit,  as  unworthy 
of  a triumph.  At  a later  period  it  was  not  less  extravagantly  magnified.  Oro- 
sius  says  of  Claudius : “ Orcadas  etiam  insulas  ultra  Britanniam  in  Oceano  posi- 
tas  Romano  adjecit  imperio.”  (vii.  5.). 


26 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  43* 


of  a triumph  as  the  meed  of  conduct  and  valour.  We  have 
seen  already  how  the  senate  hastened  to  decree  him  this  dis- 
tinction; how  he  received  the  appellation  of  Britannicus; 
how  arches  crowned  with  trophies  were  erected  to  him  in 
Rome  and  at  Gessoriacum ; how,  finally,  he  deprecated  the 
evil  eye  of  Nemesis  by  an  act  of  ungainly  humiliation. 
Cheap  and  frivolous  as  these  honours  now  were,  the  con- 
quests of  Claudius  were  really  solid  and  extensive,  and  with 
due  precaution  on  the  part  of  his  lieutenants,  might  have 
been  firmly  established  from  that  moment.  They  were  soon 
destined,  indeed,  to  suffer  a grave  disaster : but  this,  which 
broke  for  a moment  the  steady  current  of  victory,  served 
only  to  apprise  the  conquerors  of  the  real  condition  of  their 
position,  and  compel  them  to  complete  the  unfinished  work 
of  subjugation,  and  settle  at  once  the  fate  of  Britain  for  four 
hundred  years.1 

1 The  high  estimation  in  which  the  exploits  of  Claudius  were  held  appears 
from  the  inscription  (imperfect  and  conjecturally  supplied)  upon  his  arch  of 
triumph — 

TI.  CLAUdio  Drusi  f.  Caesari 
AU GUsto  Germanico  Pio 
PONTIFICI  Max.  Trib.  pot.  ix. 

COS.  V.  IMperatori  xvi.  pat.  patriae 
8ENATUS  POPUlusque  Rom.  quod 
REGES  BRITanniae  perduelles  sine 
ULLA  JACTUra  celeriter  ceperit  (?) 

GENTESQ.  extremarum  Orcadum  (?) 

PRIMUS  INDICIO  facto  R.  imperio  adjecerit  (?) 

See  Bunsen’s  Rom.,  iii.  3.  p.  91.,  Orell.  Inner.  715. ; and  compare  the  lines  in 
Seneca’s  Medea,  which  the  moderns  have  regarded  as  a prophecy,  but  may 
really  have  been  meant  to  indicate  a recent  event  in  history : 

Yenient  annis  saecula  seris 
Quibus  Oceanus  vincula  rerum 
Laxet,  et  ingens  pateat  tellus, 

Tiphysque  novos  detegat  orbes, 

Nec  sit  terris  ultima  Thule.” 

Corppare  again : 

“ Parcite  0 Divi,  veniam  precamur 
Yivat  ut  tutus  mare  qui  subegit.” 

See  the  preface  of  Lipsius  to  his  edition  of  Seneca’s  works.  These  passages 
would  be  more  interesting  could  we  feel  more  confidence  in  their  presumed 
authorship. 


A.  U.  797.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


27 


It  seems  not  impossible  that  the  prompt  submission  of  the 
Trinobantes  in  the  East  was  caused  by  the  retreat  of  the 
main  forces  of  the  nation  westward ; for  it  is  in 

Yespasian’s  ad- 

the  western  parts  of  the  island  that  we  next  hear  vance  into  the 

"yy 

of  the  operations  of  the  invaders,  and  the  chief 
who  most  obstinately  resists  them  is  still  the  Trinobantine 
Caractacus.  Yespasianus,  whose  deserts  have  already  been 
mentioned,  attracted  the  notice  of  the  emperor  during  his 
brief  visit  to  the  camp.  He  was  now  sent  in  command  of 
the  second  legion  to  reduce  the  Belgae  and  Damnonii,  who  oc- 
cupied the  south-western  regions  from  the  Solent  to  the  Axe, 
and  from  the  Axe  to  the  Tamar  or  the  Land’s  End.  From 
the  Isle  of  Wight,  the  Yectis  of  the  Romans,  to  the  rug- 
ged barrier  of  Dartmoor  Forest,  he  engaged  them  in  thirty 
battles.  Many  a fosse  and  mound,  many  a tumulus  of 
heroes’  bones,  on  the  hills  of  Wilts  and  Dorset,  still  bears 
silent  testimony  to  these  obscure  and  nameless  combats  ; and 
the  narrow  gorge  of  the  Teign,  deeply  scarred  with  alternately 
round  and  square  entrenchments,  was  the  scene,  perhaps,  of 
the  last  desperate  struggles  for  the  garden  of  Britain.1 

It  maybe  conjectured  that  the  conquest  of  this  part  of  the 
island  was  facilitated  by  the  cowardice  or  treachery  of  the 
people  of  the  East.  Cogidubnus,  king  of  the  g b.  ^ f 
Regni,  acknowledged  himself  a vassal  of  the  theSSSfm & 

_ i , i . . . cowardly  sub- 

Romans,  and  consented  to  be  their  instrument  mission  of  the 
for  the  enslavement  of  his  countrymen.  He  at- 
tached himself  as  a client  to  the  emperor,  and  assumed  the 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  44.,  Agric.  13,  14.  Eutropius  gives  the  number  of  thirty- 
two  battles.  Suet.  ( Vespas.  4.) : “ Duas  validissimas  gentes,  superque  viginti 
oppida,  et  insulam  Vectem,  Britanniae  proximam,  in  ditionem  redegit.”  In 
extending  the  operations  westward  of  the  Isle  of  Wight  I indulge  only  in  con- 
jecture ; but  the  numerous  coins  of  Claudius  which  have  been  found  at  Isca 
Damnoniorum,  or  Exeter  (see  Shortt’s  Isca  Antiqua\  indicate  a very  early  oc- 
cupation of  this  distant  position.  Isca  may  still  have  retained  the  importance 
it  evidently  once  possessed  as  the  emporium  of  the  Mediterranean  tin  trade. 
Coins  of  the  Greek  dynasties  of  Syria  and  Egypt  have  been  found  there  in 
great  abundance. 


28 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.47. 


name  of  Tiberius  Claudius.1  The  Iceni,  also,  instead  of  unit- 
ing with  the  Trinobantes  in  the  defence  of  their  common 
freedom,  appear  to  have  yielded  without  a blow  to  the  in- 
fluence of  the  invaders.  From  their  position  on  the  eastern 
coast,  and  their  habits  of  intercourse  with  the  Roman  traders 
of  the  Rhine  and  Scheldt,  they  may  have  learnt  already  to 
tremble  at  the  power  of  the  conquerors,  or  to  covet  their 
luxuries.  As  far,  therefore,  as  their  authority  extended  to 
the  wild  forests  of  the  interior,  and  possibly  even  to  the  coast 
of  the  Irish  Sea,  they  seem  to  have  retained  the  native  tribes 
in  stolid  inactivity,  while  their  neighbours  were  successively 
robbed  of  independence.  Their  king  Prasutagus,  blindly  re- 
joicing in  the  downfall  of  the  chiefs  of  Camulodunum,  opened 
his  own  strongholds  to  the  visits  of  Roman  officials,  and  al- 
lowed himself  insensibly  to  fall  under  the  tutelage  of  tribunes 
and  quaestors.  His  offer  of  a small  tribute,  in  acknowledg- 
ment of  deference  or  subjection  to  Rome,  was  soon  made  a 
pretext  for  vexatious  impositions;  and  the  encroachments 
thus  hazarded  on  the  liberties  of  his  people  goaded  them  at 
last  to  resistance  and  insurrection.* 

Plautius  was  recalled  to  Rome,  to  enjoy  the  reward  of 
his  services,  in  the  year  800.  His  successor  Ostorius  Scapula 
Campaign  of  found  himself  on  his  arrival  beset  by  the  refrac- 
Ostonus  scap-  t01y  Britons  in  various  quarters,  and  putting  his 

A.®.  47.  forces  at  once  in  marching  order,  aimed  a severe 

a.u.  800.  blow  in  the  direction  from  which  the  annoyance 

seemed  chiefly  to  proceed.  In  order  to  confine  the  still  un- 

1 Tac.  Agric.  14. : “ Quaedam  civitates  Cogidubno  Regi  donatse  (is  ad  nos- 
tram  usque  memoriam  fidissimus  mansit)  vetere  ac  jam  pridem  recepta  populi 
Romani  consuetudine,  ut  haberet  instrumenta  servitutis  et  Reges.”  The  name 
of  Tiberius  Claudius  Cogidubnus  is  preserved  in  the  curious  inscription  at  Chi- 
chester. 

2 There  can  be  no  doubt  that  Frisians,  Saxons,  and  Danes  had  settled  on 
the  eastern  coasts  of  Britain  before  the  Roman  invasion.  It  seems  probable 
that  the  Anglican  character  of  the  population  of  Norfolk  and  Suffolk  dates 
from  the  pre-Roman  period.  Hence  we  might  account  for  the  want  of  union 
between  the  Iceni  and  the  Trinobantes.  The  name  Iceni  is  still  evidently  re- 
tained in  many  localities  of  their  district,  as  in  Icknield,  Ickworth,  Exning,  &c., 


A.  U.  800.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


29 


conquered  tribes  within  the  boundary  of  the  Severn,  he  drew 
a double  line  of  posts  along  the  course  of  that  river  and  the 
Avon,  into  the  heart  of  the  island.1  This  last  measure,  per- 
haps, roused  the  jealousy  of  the  Iceni,  or  inflamed  their  dis- 
content. It  seems  to  have  trenched  on  some  rights  of  sov- 
ereignty exercised  by  them  in  those  parts,  and  threatened  to 
overawe  them,  faithful  as  they  had  proved  themselves,  no 
less  than  the  turbulent  barbarians  of  the  West.  They  flew 
suddenly  to  arms,  suffered  a severe  defeat,  and  again  relapsed 
into  a state  of  sullen  submission.  Peace  being  thus  restored 
in  his  rear,  Ostorius  had  leisure  to  penetrate  into  the  country 
of  the  Cangi,  a tribe  which  our  antiquaries  have  commonly 
placed  in  the  furthest  corner  of  Carnarvonshire,  the  promon- 
tory or  peninsula  of  the  Cangani.8  There  is  not  much,  in- 
deed, to  support  this  bold  conjecture : nevertheless,  wherever 
the  true  locality  is  to  be  sought,  the  relations  of  the  Roman 
commander  now  extended  far  over  Britain ; for  he  was  re- 
called from  his  attack  upon  the  Cangi  by  a hostile  movement 
of  the  Brigantes,  a people  who  undoubtedly  held  the  regions 
north  of  the  Mersey,  and  whose  power  extended  from  sea  to 
sea.3  No  sooner  were  these  ill-combined  efforts  repressed, 
and  submission  secured  by  a judicious  mixture  of  energy  and 
moderation,  than  the  attention  of  Ostorius  was  called  to  the 
coercion  of  the  Silures,  the  people  of  South  Wales,  who  con- 
tinued, under  the  guidance  of  Caractacus,  to  threaten  the 

and  has  certainly  a Tuetonic  sound.  It  has  been  suggested  that,  though  writ- 
ten by  the  Greeks  ’Iivjvoi,  the  second  syllable,  which  disappears  in  all  these 
words,  was  probably  short. 

1 The  ground  on  which  we  tread  here,  following  the  general  consent  of  our 
critics  from  Camden  downwards,  is  most  uncertain.  Neither  the  names  nor 
the  construction  can  be  made  out  clearly  from  the  MSS.  of  Tacitus.  Ritter 
reads : “ Cunctaque  castris  Avonam  usque  et  Sabrinam  fluvios  cohibere  parat.” 
Tac.  Ann.  xii.  31. 

2 Ptol.  Geogr.  ii.  3.  Tacitus,  however,  declares  that  Ostorius  nearly  reached 
the  Irish  sea:  “Ductus  in  Cangos  exereitus  ....  vastati  agri  ....  jam 
ventum  haud  procul  mari  quod  Hiberniam  insulam  aspect  at.”  Ann.  xii.  32. 
Ritter  reads  “Decantos,”  a name  found  also  in  Ptolemy,  for  “Cangos.”  Nei- 
ther tribe  is  mentioned  elsewhere. 

3 Seneca  calls  them  “ caeruleos  scuta  Brigantas  ” ( Apocol . 12). 


30 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  50. 


outposts  of  the  Roman  power,  and  obstruct  their  communica- 
tions. From  the  name  of  their  chief,  who  seems,  as  before 
observed,  to  have  been  the  son  of  Cunobelin,  it  would  appear 
that  the  Silures,  far  westward  as  their  district  lay,  bore  some 
relation  of  dependence  or  descent  to  the  leading  nation  of  the 
Foundation  of  East.  This  relation  is  again  indicated  by  the 
^muiodunum.  establishment,  of  which  we  are  now  apprised,  of 
a d 50  a c°l°ny  at  Camulodunum,  on  purpose  to  check 

a.  it.  803.  and  overawe  them.1  Ostorius  was  commissioned 

by  the  emperor  to  plant  a military  colony  in  Britain,  to 
become  the  stronghold  of  the  Roman  power  in  the  island. 
For  this  purpose  the  site  of  the  Trinobantine  capital,  far  as  it 
was  removed  from  the  seat  of  hostilities  at  the  time,  was 
chosen.  If  far  from  the  Severn  and  the  mountains  of  Siluria, 
it  lay  so  much  the  nearer  to  Gaul,  and  the  centre  of  the 
Roman  resources.  It  was  the  proper  base  of  the  Roman 
operations  for  the  entire  subjugation  of  the  island.  If  not  in 
the  direct  route  from  Gessoriacum  and  Lugdunum  to  Britain, 
it  was  not  far  distant  from  it ; it  lay  to  the  north  of  the 
broad  Thames ; it  overshadowed  the  dubious  territories  of 
the  Iceni ; while  the  prompt  submission  of  the  Regni  on  the 
shores  of  the  channel,  might  avail  to  exempt  them  from  the 
burden  of  so  unwelcome  a guest  in  their  peaceful  country. 
Farther,  the  establishment  of  a colony  in  the  country  of  the 
Trinobantes,  involving  as  it  did  the  confiscation  of  a portion 
of  their  soil,  the  utter  subjection  of  their  people,  the  over- 
throw of  their  civil  polity,  might  be  inflicted  on  them  to  pun- 
ish the  protracted  resistance  of  their  chief  among  the  dis- 
tant tribes  to  whom  he  had  betaken  himself.  On  all  these 
accounts  the  foundation  of  the  colony  of  Camulodunum  may 
'not  seem  so  irrelevant,  as  some  have  considered  it,  to  the  con- 
test now  pending  between  the  Romans  and  the  Silures.2 3 

1 Such  is  the  express  declaration  of  Tacitus : “ Id  quo  promptius  veniret 

(i.  e.  the  reduction  of  the  Silures),  Colonia  Camulodunum  ....  deducitur.” 

3 Tac.  Ann.  xii.  32.  It  is  on  account  of  this  presumed  incongruity  that 
some  antiquarians  have  actually  supposed  that  Camulodunum  was  somewhere 
in  North  Wales. 


A.  U.  803.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


31 


Under  the  republic  the  colony  was  a direct  offshoot  from 
the  parent  city : a number  of  citizens  were  told  off  by  lot  to 
occupy,  like  a swarm  of  bees,  to  which  they  were 

5 . . 7 . J . Character  of  the 

commonly  compared,  their  appointed  station;  Roman  colony 

and  the  soil  of  the  conquered  land  was  appro- 
priated to  them  as  their  ager  or  national  territory.  As  an 
offset  from  a nation  of  soldiers  the  colonists  were  themselves 
all  soldiers,  and  their  new  city,  founded  on  the  principles  of 
the  old,  was  in  fact  a stationary  camp,  furnished  with  the 
same  civil  and  military  appliances  as  the  metropolis  itself; 
not  only  with  the  streets  and  houses,  the  walls  and  ditch,  but 
with  the  temples  and  tribunals,  above  all  with  the  sacred 
Augural,  or  spot  on  which  the  auspices  might  be  duly  ob- 
served. But  the  citizen  had  now  lost  most  of  his  military 
traditions.  When  he  migrated  to  a foreign  settlement,  it 
was  generally  as  a private  trader  or  adventurer.  The  civ- 
ilian could  no  longer  be  induced  to  relinquish  his  peaceful 
indulgences  and  go  forth  armed  and  booted,  in  the  prospect 
of  a slender  patrimony  to  be  cultivated  with  toil  and  defend- 
ed with  his  blood.  On  the  other  hand  the  paid  defenders  of 
the  state, — the  military  profession,  as  it  had  now  become, — 
were  no  longer  fit  to  return,  after  many  years  of  service,  to 
the  staid  habits  of  the  municipium  from  which  they  had  been 
levied : they  retained  no  taste  for  the  amenities  of  civil  life, 
and  might  even  be  dangerous  in  the  crowded  streets  and 
among  the  mutinous  rabble  of  a vicious  city.  The  colony 
was  now  merely  a convenient  receptacle  for  the  discharged 
veterans  of  the  camp.  Transferred  from  active  duty  in  the 
field  or  the  parade,  to  which  they  were  no  longer  equal,  they 
were  expected  to  maintain,  as  armed  pensioners  of  the  state, 
the  terror  of  the  Roman  name  on  the  frontiers  by  their  proud 
demeanour  and  habits  of  discipline,  rather  than  by  the 
strength  of  hands  now  drooping  at  their  sides.  The  lands 
of  the  Trinobantes  were  wrested  from  their  ancient  possess- 
ors and  conveyed  to  the  new  intruders : the  veterans  estab- 
lished themselves  in  the  dwellings  of  the  hapless  natives, 
desecrated  their  holy  places,  applied  to  their  own  use  their 


32 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  50. 


goods  and  chattels,  perhaps  even  their  wives  and  daughters ; 
and  if  they  left  them  any  rights  at  all,  set  up  tribunals  of 
their  own  to  decide  every  matter  in  dispute  with  them.  The 
colonists  in  an  assembly  of  their  own,  like  the  comitia  of  the 
Roman  people,  chose  their  own  officers,  and  governed  them- 
selves by  their  own  regulations  and  by-laws ; holding  them- 
selves ever  ready  to  fly  to  arms  in  defence  of  their  common 
usurpation.  In  the  colony  of  Camulodunum  the  Britons 
beheld  an  image,  rude  indeed,  and  distorted,  of  the  camp  on 
the  Rhine  or  Danube,  combined  with  the  city  on  the  Tiber. 
They  enjoyed,  as  far  as  they  could  learn  to  appreciate  it,  a 
faint  reflex  of  the  civilization  of  the  South,  and  were  taught 
to  ascribe  the  fortune  of  their  conquerors  to  the  favour  of 
strange  divinities,  to  whom  altars  were  erected  and  victims 
slain.  But  to  none  of  these  did  they  see  such  honour  paid 
inauguration  of  as  to  Claudius  himself,  in  the  name  of  none  were 
Saudius  atPcL  80  many  yows  conceived,  as  of  the  emperor 
muiodunum.  whose  person  they  had  once  beheld  visibly 
among  them ; of  whom  they  still  heard  by  report,  as  the 
presiding  genius  of  the  empire,  the  centre  of  the  world’s 
adoration.  A temple  of  unusual  size  and  splendour  was 
erected  to  this  divinity  in  the  colony  of  Camulodunum,  or 
the  Conquering  Claudian,  as  it  was  officially  styled,  special 
estates  were  granted  for  its  service,  and  the  most  distinguish- 
ed among  the  Britons  were  invited  to  enrol  themselves  in  the 
college  of  the  Claudian  Flamens.1 

In  one  respect,  however,  the  new  colony  fell  short  both 
of  the  city  and  the  camp,  on  the  plan  of  which  it  was  de- 
security  of  the  signed.  The  capital  of  the  Trinobantes  has 
Romans.  already  been  described  as  a vast  enclosure  for 
retreat  from  invasion,  occupied  by  clusters  of  straggling  huts 
and  cabins,  with  no  continuous  streets,  still  less  with  any 
regular  fortifications.  Such  a mode  of  agglomeration,  com- 
mon to  the  Britons  with  the  Germans,  and  at  least  the 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  31.;  Orell.  Inscript.  208.:  “Colonia  Victricensis  quse  est 
in  Britannia  Camuloduni.” 


A.  U.  803.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


33 


northern  Gauls,  was  altogether  foreign  to  the  habits  of  the 
Romans,  who  dwelt  always  in  compact  masses  of  habita- 
tions, laid  out  on  plans  comparatively  regular,  and  defended 
by  works  of  military  art.  The  oppidum  was  the  British,  the 
urbs  was  the  Roman  city.  But  the  veterans  who  now  occu- 
pied the  stronghold  of  Cunobelin  were  too  indolent,  it  seems, 
to  trace  the  lines  of  a fortress  for  their  own  protection : they 
found  the  site  of  their  new  dwellings  agreeable,  the  houses 
even  of  the  Britons  were  to  the  rude  inmates  of  the  tent  not 
inconvenient : they  furnished  themselves  with  a temple,  a 
senate-house,  and  even  a theatre  for  the  amusement  of  their 
idleness ; they  erected  a statue  of  Victory  to  commemorate 
their  triumph ; but  they  delayed  to  construct  the  necessary 
defences,  and  in  contemptuous  disregard  for  the  conquered 
enemy,  continued  to  enjoy  their  new-acquired  ease  with  no 
apprehensions  for  their  future  security.1  However  slight 
might  be  the  influence  of  this  type  of  southern  culture  upon 
the  distant  Silures,  the  Iceni,  whose  frontier  bordered  closely 
upon  it,  were  powerfully  affected.  They  beheld  with  admi- 
ration the  advance  of  luxury  and  splendour,  and  acquiesced 
once  more,  with  increasing  fervour,  in  the  terms  of  unequal 
alliance  proffered  by  the  Romans. 

Thus  doubly  secured  by  the  influence  of  arms  and  arts  in 
his  rear,  Ostorius  was  enabled  to  bring  the  whole  weight  of 
his  forces  to  bear  on  the  still  unconquered  Silures.  t f 
For  nine  years  Caractacus,  at  the  head  of  the  in-  Caractacus  and 
dependent  Britons,  had  maintained  the  conquest 
with  the  invaders.  The  genius  of  this  patriot  chief,  the  first 
of  our  national  heroes,  may  be  estimated,  not  from  victories, 
of  which  the  envious  foe  has  left  us  no  account,  but  from  the 
length  of  his  gallant  resistance,  and  the  magnitude  of  the 
operations  which  it  was  necessary  to  direct  against  him. 
How  often  he  may  have  burst  from  the  mountains  of 
Wales,  and  swept  with  his  avenging  squadrons  the  fields  of 
the  Roman  settlers  on  the  Severn  and  the  Avon, — how  often 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  31.:  “Dum  amoenitati  prius  quam  usui  consulitur.” 

VOL  VL — 3 


34 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  50. 


he  may  have  plunged  again  into  his  fastnesses,  and  led  the 
pursuers  into  snares  prepared  for  them  beyond  the  Wye  and 
the  Usk, — remains  for  ever  buried  in  the  oblivion  which  has 
descended  on  the  heroic  deeds  of  the  enemies  of  Rome. 
Worn  out,  or  starved  out,  or  circumvented  perchance  by  the 
toils  ever  closing  around  him,  he  made  a last  effort  to  re- 
move the  seat  of  war  from  the  country  of  the  Silures  to  that 
of  the  Ordovices  or  North  Wales,  the  common  boundary  of 
the  two  lying  probably  between  the  Wye  and  the  Teme.1 
Ostorius  having  returned  from  his  foray  among  the  Cangi, 
having  chastised  and  pacified  the  Brigantes,  and  established 
at  the  same  time  his  colony  at  Camulodunum,  collected  all 
his  strength  to  crush  this  last  effort  of  resistance.  To  attack 
the  Silures  he  would  descend  probably  from  his  northern 
stations  along  the  course  of  the  Severn ; the  Britons,  hover- 
ing on  the  eastern  flanks  of  the  Welsh  mountains,  would 
draw  him  up  one  of  their  lateral  valleys  to  the  westward ; 
but  whether  he  forced  his  passage  by  the  gorges  of  the  Ver- 
niew,  or  the  upper  Severn,  by  the  Clun,  the  Teme,  or  the 
Wye,  seems  impossible  to  determine.  Each  of  these  routes 
has  had  its  advocates,  and  to  this  day  the  surviving  descend- 
ants of  the  Britons  contend  with  generous  emulation  for  the 
honour  of  the  discovery.  All  along  the  frontier  of  the  prin- 
cipality every  hill  crowned  with  an  old  entrenchment,  and 
fronted  by  a stream,  has  been  claimed  as  the  scene  of  the 
last  struggle  of  British  independence ; there  are  at  least  six 
Richmonds  in  the  field,  and  the  discreet  historian  must  de- 
cide between  them.2 

* From  the  distances  marked  in  the  xii.  and  xiii.  Itinera  of  Antoninus  it 
has  been  supposed  that  Branogenium  (of  the  Ordovices)  is  at  Leintwardine  on 
the  Teme,  and  Magna  (of  the  Silures)  at  Kentchester,  a little  north  of  the  Wye. 
The  boundary,  therefore,  would  lie  between  these  two  rivers. 

2 The  spots  which  have  been  most  confidently  assigned  for  the  last  battle 
of  Caractacus  are  Coxall  Knoll,  on  the  Teme,  near  Leintwardine  (Roy) ; Cefn 
Camedd,  west  of  the  Severn,  near  Llanidloes  (Hartshorne,  Salop.  Antiq.  p.  63); 
Caer  Caradoc,  on  the  Clun,  in  Shropshire  (Gough’s  Camden , iii.  p.  3,  13) ; and 
the  Breiddhen  hills,  near  Welshpool,  on  the  Severn  ( Archceol . Cambr.  April, 
1851).  A Roman  camp,  now  called  Castel  Collen,  may  be  traced  as  far  west 


A.  U.  803.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


35 


Caractacus  took  up  a position  of  his  own  choosing,  where 
the  means  both  of  approach  and  of  retreat  were  most  con- 
venient for  himself  and  unfavourable  to  the 

Last  battle  and 

enemy.  It  was  defended  m part  by  a steep  and  overthrow  of 

J J r Caractacus. 

lofty  acclivity  ; in  part  by  stones  rudely  thrown 
together  ; a stream  with  no  frequented  ford  flowed  before  it, 
and  chosen  bands  of  his  best  armed  and  bravest  warriors 
were  stationed  in  front  of  its  defences.1  To  the  spirit  and 
eloquence  of  the  chief  the  Britons  responded  with  shouts  of 
enthusiasm,  and  each  tribe  bound  itself  by  the  oaths  it  held 
most  sacred,  to  stand  its  ground  or  fall,  if  it  must  fall,  fight- 
ing. O storius,  on  his  part,  was  amazed  at  the  ardour  of  men 
whom  he  supposed  to  be  beaten,  cowed,  and  driven  hope- 
lessly to  bay.  He  was  even  disconcerted  at  the  strength  of 
the  British  position,  and  the  swarms  which  defended  it.  It 
was  the  eagerness  of  the  soldiers  rather  than  his  own  courage 
or  judgment  that  determined  him  to  give  the  signal  for  at- 
tack. The  stream  was  crossed  without  difficulty,  for  every 
legionary  was  a swimmer,  and  the  Britons  had  no  engines 

as  the  Ython,  near  Rhayader,  and  here,  too,  a suitable  locality  might  be  found. 
But  all  is  misty  conjecture.  It  would  seem  that  Ostorius,  intending  to  strike 
at  the  centre  of  Siluria,  was  drawn  north-westward  by  the  movements  of  Ca- 
ractacus into  the  country  of  the  Ordovices,  along  one  of  the  lateral  valleys 
that  issue  from  the  Welsh  mountains.  Tacitus  says  only:  “Transfert  bellum 
in  Ordovices.”  Ann.  xii.  33. 

1 Tac.  1.  c.  “ Prsefluebat  amnis  vado  incerto.”  This  seems  to  imply,  not 
that  the  stream  was  actually  deep  or  rapid,  but  that  crossing  no  road  at  the 
spot,  it  had  no  accustomed  ford.  Even  the  season  of  the  year  is  not  men- 
tioned, so  that  we  cannot  tell  whether  the  water  was  above  or  below  its  ordi- 
nary height.  It  seems,  however,  to  have  been  crossed  without  difficulty.  The 
character  of  Coxall  Knoll,  which  many  years  ago  I examined  with  more  faith 
than  I can  now  indulge  in,  is  not  inconsistent  with  the  narrative.  The  river  is 
now  a narrow  and  shallow  stream,  at  least  in  the  middle  of  summer,  and  deeply 
tinged  by  the  peat-mosses  through  which  it  flows : “ Yisus  adhuc  amnis  veteri 
de  clade  rubere.”  The  hill,  steep  in  front,  but  easily  accessible  from  the  rear, 
is  crowned  with  considerable  earthworks.  On  descending  from  the  spdt  which 
I believed  to  be  the  scene  of  the  eclipse  of  British  freedom,  I found  an  Italian 
organ-boy  making  sport  at  an  alehouse  door  to  a group  of  Welsh  peasants.  I 
could  not  fail  to  moralize  with  Tacitus : “ Rebus  humanis  inest  quidam  orbis.” 


36 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  50. 


for  hurling  missiles  from  a distance,  nor  were  they  noted  even 
for  the  rude  artillery  of  bows  and  slings.  But  they  defended 
their  rampart  obstinately  with  poles  and  javelins,  and  from 
behind  it  dealt  wounds  and  death  upon  the  assailants  till  the 
Romans  could  form  the  tortoise,  approach  to  the  foot  of  the 
wall,  tear  down  its  uncemented  materials,  and  bursting  in, 
challenge  them  to  combat  hand  to  hand.  Unequal  to  the 
shock  of  the  Roman  array,  the  Britons  retreated  up  the  hill ; 
the  Romans,  both  the  light  and  the  heavy-armed,  pressed 
gallantly  upon  them,  and  imperfectly  as  they  were  equipped, 
they  could  withstand  neither  the  sword  and  pilum  of  the 
legionary,  nor  the  lance  and  spear  of  the  allies.  The  victory, 
quickly  decided,  was  brilliant  and  complete.  The  wife  and 
daughter  of  Caractacus  were  taken ; his  brothers  threw  down 
their  arms  and  surrendered.1 

The  brave  chief  himself  escaped  from  the  slaughter,  evad- 
ed the  pursuit,  and  found  an  asylum  for  a time  in  the  terri- 
tory of  the  Brigantes,  leaving  all  the  south  open 
to  the  invaders.  He  might  hope  to  remove  the 
contest  to  the  northern  parts  of  the  island,  a land 
of  streams  and  mountains  like  his  own  long-de- 
fended Siluria:  but  Cartismandua,  the  female 
chief  of  this  nation  (for  though  married  she  seems  herself, 
rather  than  her  husband  Yenutius,  to  have  been  actual  ruler 
of  the  Brigantes),  was  determined  by  her  own  fears  and  in- 
terests to  betray  him  to  the  Romans.  The  fame  of  his  nine 
years’  struggle  had  penetrated  beyond  the  British  isles  and 
the  Gaulish  provinces ; and  when  he  was  led  captive  through 

1 Caractacus,  Togodumnus,  and  Adminius  have  been  mentioned  from  Dion 
as  the  sons  of  Cunobelin.  We  have  disposed  of  the  two  last;  but  Tacitus 
seems  here  to  refer  to  other  surviving  brothers  of  the  family.  From  this  pre- 
sumed discrepancy,  coupled  with  the  remoteness  of  the  campaigns  of  Caracta- 
cus from  the  country  of  Cunobelin,  it  has  been  imagined  that  Dion  was  in  error, 
and  that  the  British  hero  was  a native  chief  of  the  remote  Silures,  and  not  a 
Trinobantine.  So  also  the  Welsh  traditions  represent  Caractacus  as  a Silurian ; 
but  are  not  these  the  traditions  of  a people  hemmed  in  between  the  Severn  and 
the  Irish  Channel,  who  had  long  forgotten  that  they  had  once  extended  to  the 
German  Ocean? 


Caractacus  be- 
trayed by  Car- 
tismandua. Ex- 
hibited at 
Eome  and  par- 
doned by  Clau- 
dius. 


A.  U.  803.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


37 


the  streets  of  Rome,  great  was  the  curiosity  of  the  citizens 
to  behold  the  hero  who  had  rivalled  the  renown  of  Arminius 
and  Tacfarinas.  The  triumph  of  Claudius  had  been  solem- 
nized before;  but  the  emperor  gratified  his  vanity  by  exhib- 
iting the  British  prince  before  the  imperial  tribunal.  A grand 
military  spectacle  was  devised,  in  which  Claudius  appeared 
seated  before  the  gates  of  the  praetorian  camp,  attended  by 
his  guards,  and  surrounded  by  the  multitude  of  citizens. 
Agrippina,  clothed  like  himself  in  a military  garb,  took  her 
seat  on  the  tribunal  by  his  side,  the  ensigns  of  a Roman  army 
floating  over  her  head.  The  slaves  and  clients  of  the  van- 
quished prince  were  first  led  before  them,  with  the  glittering 
trophies  of  his  arms  and  accoutrements.  Behind  these 
marched  the  brothers,  the  wife,  and  the  tender  daughter  of 
the  hero,  and  their  pusillanimous  wailings  moved  no  pity  in 
the  spectators.  But  the  bearing  of  Caractacus  himself,  who 
closed  the  train  of  captives,  was  noble  and  worthy  of  his 
noble  cause : nor  did  it  fail  to  excite  the  admiration  it  deserv- 
ed. He  was  permitted  to  address  the  emperor.  He  remind- 
ed Claudius  that  the  obstinacy  of  his  resistance  enhanced  the 
glory  of  his  defeat ; were  he  now  ignominiously  put  to  death, 
the  fate  of  so  many  worsted  enemies  of  Rome,  his  name  and 
exploits  would  be  soon  forgotten ; but  if  bid  to  live,  they 
would  be  eternally  remembered,  as  a memorial  of  the  empe- 
ror’s clemency.  The  imperial  historian  was  easily  moved  by 
an  appeal  to  his  yearning  for  historic  celebrity.1  He  granted 
the  lives  of  his  illustrious  captives,  and  bade  them  give 
thanks,  not  to  himself  only  but  to  his  consort,  who  shared 
with  him  the  toils  and  distinctions  of  empire.  It  was  politic 
as  well  as  merciful  to  spare  the  legitimate  claimant  of  a Brit- 
ish throne ; to  keep  him  at  Rome  to  be  employed  as  occasion 
might  suggest : and  thus  Caractacus,  we  may  believe,  was 
retained,  together  with  his  family,  in  honourable  custody,  till 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xii.  36-38.  Such  an  act  of  clemency  in  a Roman  imperator 
must  not  be  passed  by  without  especial  notice.  Claudius  stands  in  honourable 
contrast  to  the  murderers  of  Pontius,  of  Perses,  of  Jugurtha,  and  Vercinge- 
torix. 


38 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  50. 


he  grew  old  in  long-deferred  hope  of  restoration.  They  were 
enrolled  perhaps  among  the  clients  of  the  Clandian  house ; 
and  indulgence  may  he  challenged  for  the  pleasing  conjec- 
ture, that  Claudia  the  foreigner , Claudia  the  offspring  of 
the  painted  Britons , whose  charms  and  genius  are  celebrated 
by  Martial,  was  actually  the  child  of  the  hero  Caractacus.1 

The  victory  had  been  the  most  complete,  and  in  its  re- 
sults the  most  important,  that  had  yet  occurred  in  Britain  ; 

and  there  was  no  mean  servility  in  the  senators 
sistance  of  the  extolling  the  emperor’s  fame  and  fortune  to  the 
skies,  and  comparing  him  to  a Scipio  and  a Paulus, 
who  had  exhibited  a Syphax  and  a Perses  to  the  applauding 
citizens.  To  Ostorius  was  accorded  the  triumphal  orna- 
ments ; but  he  had  not  yet  leisure  to  repose  on  his  laurels, 
for  the  Britons  flew  again  to  arms  on  the  capture  of  their 
champion,  and  maintained  on  the  skirts  of  their  mountain 
fastnesses  a warfare  of  forays  and  surprises,  which  still  kept 
the  Romans  on  the  alert.  Again  and  again  defeated,  they 
still  found  means  to  revenge  their  losses.  Harassed  and  de- 
cimated, they  retaliated  by  bloody  massacres.  They  were 
roused  to  despair,  however  fruitless,  by  the  ferocious  threats 
of  the  prefect,  who  vowed  to  destroy  and  extinguish  their 
very  name,  as  that  of  the  Sigambri,  once  so  formidable,  had 
been  utterly  obliterated  in  Germany.2 

On  the  death  of  Ostorius,  which  shortly  ensued  from 
chagrin,  it  is  said,  as  much  as  from  fatigue,  the  province  was 
entrusted  to  Didius,  sent  in  haste  from  Rome  to  take  the 
command.  During  the  interval,  while  the  legions  perhaps 
were  careless  or  reluctant  in  their  obedience  to  an  inferior 
officer,  the  Roman  arms  suffered  an  ignominious  check  from 

1 Martial,  ii.  54.,  iv.  13.  This  was  the  faith  of  Fuller,  Stillingfleet,  and 
our  old  ecclesiastical  historians,  who  identified  this  princess  at  the  same  time 
with  Claudia,  the  convert  of  St.  Paul.  More  favour  has  been  recently  shown 
to  the  ingenious  hypothesis  of  Mr.  Williams,  who  infers,  from  the  remarkable 
inscription  at  Chichester,  that  the  Claudia  of  Martial  and  St.  Paul  was  daugh- 
ter of  king  Cogidubnus.  On  this  subject  I shall  have  occasion  to  speak  again. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xii.  38,  39. 


A.  U.  803.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


39 


the  Silures,  and  the  province  itself  seemed  for  a moment  to 
lie  at  their  mercy.  The  arrival  of  Didius,  old  and  inactive 
as  he  was,  served  to  brace  again  the  discipline  of  his  armies, 
and  they  recovered  their  superiority.  But  the  transient  shock 
their  reputation  had  suffered  broke  the  charm  of  success.  Car- 
tismandua,  who  had  delivered  Caractacus  to  the  cartismandua 
Romans,  and  in  return  had  been  upheld  by  their  £IrrownsS>7 
influence  against  the  indignation  of  her  country-  jects* 
men,  was  now  expelled  from  her  realm  by  a popular  insurrec- 
tion. Relying  on  her  foreign  defenders,  she  had  driven  away 
her  mock-husband  Venutius,  slain  some  of  his  kinsmen,  and 
degraded  herself  to  the  embrace  of  a menial.  The  Brigan- 
tes  took  the  side  of  the  injured  husband,  placed  him,  as  a 
noted  warrior,  at  their  head,  attacked  the  queen  in  her  strong- 
hold, and  had  nearly  succeeded  in  overpowering  her,  when 
Didius  interfered,  and  released  her  from  her  peril.  But  the 
new  prefect  did  not  attempt  to  recover  the  footing  of  the 
Romans  in  the  North.  He  allowed  Venutius  to  seat  himself 
once  more  on  the  throne  of  the  Brigantes,  and  was  content 
with  keeping  watch  over  his  power,  and  occasionally  advanc- 
ing an  outpost  beyond  his  borders.  Such  was  the  state  of 
affairs  which  continued  to  subsist  in  this  quarter  twenty  years 
later.1 

Thus  unsettled  were  the  limits  of  the  Roman  occupation 
at  the  close  of  the  reign  of  Claudius.  The  southern  part  of 
the  island  from  the  Stour  to  the  Exe  and  Severn 

n , . -|  . rt  The  Roman 

formed  a compact  and  organized  province,  from  province  of 
which  only  the  realm  of  Cogidubnus,  retaining  still 
the  character  of  a dependent  sovereignty,  is  to  be  subtract- 
ed.2 Beyond  the  Stour,  again,  the  territory  of  the  Iceni  con- 
stituted another  extraneous  dependency.  The  government 
of  the  province  was  administered  from  Camulodunum,  as  its 
capital ; and  the  whole  country  was  overawed  by  the  martial 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xii.  40. ; Hist.  iii.  45. ; Agric.  14. : “ Parta  a prioribus  conti- 
nuit  paucis  admodum  castellis  in  ulteriora  promotis.” 

2 Tacitus,  who  entered  public  life  thirty  years  later,  says  of  him  [Agric.  14.): 
“ Is  ad  nostram  usque  memoriam  fidissimus  mansit.” 


40 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  50. 


attitude  of  the  Conquering  Colony  there  established.  Al- 
ready, perhaps,  Londinium,  though  distinguished  by  no  such 
honourable  title,  excelled  it  as  a place  of  commercial  resort. 
The  broad  estuary  of  the  Thames,  confronting  the  waters  of 
the  Scheldt  and  Maas,  was  well  placed  for  the  exchange  of 
British  against  Gaulish  and  German  products ; and  the  hill 
on  which  the  city  stood,  facing  the  southern  sun,  and  adapt- 
ed for  defence,  occupies  precisely  the  spot  where  first  the 
river  can  be  crossed  conveniently.  Swept  east  and  west  by 
the  tidal  stream,  and  traversed  north  and  south  by  the  con- 
tinuous British  roads,  Londinium  supplied  the  whole  island 
with  the  luxuries  of  another  zone,  just  as  Massilia  had  sup- 
plied Gaul.1  Hither  led  the  ways  which  penetrated  Britain 
from  the  ports  in  the  Channel,  from  Lymne,  Richborough 
and  Dover.  From  hence  they  diverged  again  to  Camulo- 
dunum  north-east,  and  to  Verulamium  north-west,  where  the 
chief  lines  of  communication  intersected  one  another.  While 
the  prefect,  as  governor-in-chief  of  the  province,  was  occu- 
pied on  the  frontier  in  military  operations,  the  finances  were 
administered  by  a procurator ; and  whatever  extortions  he 
might  countenance,  so  slight  was  the  apprehension  of  any 
formidable  resistance,  that  not  only  the  towns,  now  frequent- 
ed by  thousands  of  Roman  traders,  were  left  unfortified,  but 
the  province  itself  was  suffered  to  remain  almost  denuded  of 
soldiers.  The  legions  now  permanently  quar- 

Station  of  the  _ . _ . . & _ % _ . _ / ^ _ 

presidiary  ie-  tered  m Britain  were  still  the  four  which  have  be- 
fore been  mentioned.  Of  these  the  Second,  the 
same  which  under  the  command  of  Vespasian  had  recently 
conquered  the  south-west,  was  now  perhaps  stationed  in  the 
forts  on  the  Severn  and  Avon,  or  advanced  to  the  encamp- 
ment on  the  Usk,  whence  sprang  the  famous  city  of  Caerleon, 
the  camp  of  the  Legion.2 * *  The  Ninth  was  placed  in  guard 

1 Milton : “ Me  tenet  urbs  rejlua  quam  Thamesis  alluit  unda ; ” not  Reading 
or  Windsor,  but  London,  the  only  city  on  the  tidal  waters  of  the  Thames. 

2 The  Roman  towns  and  villas,  which  have  been  discovered  in  such  num- 

bers along  the  course  of  the  Severn  and  Avon,  grew  probably  out  of  their  sys- 

tem of  defences  against  the  long  untamed  brigandage  of  the  western  mountain- 


A.  U.  803. J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


41 


over  the  Iceni,  whose  fidelity  was  not  beyond  suspicion.  We 
may  conjecture  that  its  headquarters  were  planted  as  far 
north  as  the  Wash,  where  it  might  dislocate  any  combina- 
tions these  people  should  attempt  to  form  with  their  unsteady 
neighbours  the  Brigantes.  The  Twentieth  would  be  required 
to  confront  the  Brigantes  also  on  their  western  frontier,  and 
to  them  we  may  assign  the  position  on  the  Deva  or  Dee, 
from  which  the  ancient  city  of  Chester  has  derived  its  name, 
its  site,  and  the  foundations,  at  least,  of  its  venerable  fortifi- 
cations.1 There  still  remained  another  legion,  the  Four- 
teenth ; but  neither  w~as  this  held  in  reserve  in  the  interior 
of  the  province.  The  necessities  of  border  warfare  required 
its  active  operations  among  the  Welsh  mountains,  which  it 
penetrated  step  by  step,  and  gradually  worked  its  way  tow- 
ards the  last  asylum  of  the  Druids  in  Mona,  or 

* i rrv,  n . , • i t .,  Retreat  of  the 

Anglesey,  Ihe  Daulish  priesthood,  proscribed  Druids  into  An- 
in  their  own  country,  would  naturally  fly  for  glesey' 
refuge  to  Britain : proscribed  in  Britain,  wherever  the  power 
of  Rome  extended,  they  retreated,  inch  by  inch,  and  with- 
drew from  the  massive  shrines  which  still  attest  their  influ- 
ence on  our  southern  plains,  to  the  sacred  recesses  of  the  lit- 
tle island,  surrounded  by  boiling  tides,  and  clothed  with  im- 
penetrable thickets.  In  this  gloomy  lair,  secure  apparently, 
though  shorn  of  might  and  dignity,  they  still  persisted  in  the 
practice  of  their  unholy  superstition.  They  strove,  perhaps, 
like  the  trembling  priests  of  Mexico,  to  appease  the  gods, 
who  seemed  to  avert  their  faces,  with  more  horrid  sacrifices 
than  ever.  Here  they  retained  their  assemblies,  their  schools, 
and  their  oracles ; here  was  the  asylum  of  the  fugitives ; here 
was  the  sacred  grove,  the  abode  of  the  awful  Deity,  which 

eers.  The  Caesars  had  their  Welsh  marches  as  well  as  the  Plantagenets.  Isca 
Silurum  must  have  been  an  important  post  for  the  protection  of  the  Roman 
ironworks  in  the  Forest  of  Dean. 

1 The  position  of  the  headquarters  of  the  Second  legion  at  Isca  Silurum 
(Caerleon),  and  of  the  Twentieth  at  Deva  (Chester),  is  established  from  lapi- 
dary remains.  These  may  be  no  doubt  of  a later  period,  but,  as  a general 
rule,  these  positions,  after  the  first  consolidation  of  the  Roman  power,  were 
permanent. 


42 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  61. 


in  the  stillest  noon  of  night  or  day  the  priest  himself  scarce 
ventured  to  enter,  lest  he  should  rush  unwitting  into  the 
presence  of  its  Lord.1 

Didius  had  been  satisfied  with  retaining  the  Roman  ac- 
quisitions, and  had  made  no  attempt  to  extend  them ; and 
his  successor,  Veranius,  had  contented  himself 
linus  routs  the  with  some  trifling  incursions  into  the  country  of 
gies?y.smAn  the  Silures.  The  death  of  Veranius  prevented, 
a.  d.  6i.  perhaps,  more  important  operations.  But  he  had 

a.  tj.  8i4.  exercised  rigorous  discipline  in  the  camp,  and 

Suetonius  Paullinus,  who  next  took  the  command,  found  the 
legions  well  equipped  and  well  disposed,  and  their  stations 
connected  by  military  roads  across  the  whole  breadth  of  the 
island.  The  rumours  of  the  city  marked  out  this  man  as  a 
rival  to  the  gallant  Corbulo,  and  great  successes  were  ex- 
pected from  the  measures  which  he  would  be  prompt  in 
adopting.  Leaving  the  Second  legion  on  the  TJsk  to  keep 
the  Silures  in  check,  and  the  Twentieth  on  the  Bee  to  watch 
the  Brigantes,  he  joined  the  quarters  of  the  Fourteenth,  now 
pushed  as  far  as  Segontium  on  the  Menai  straits.2  He  pre- 
pared a number  of  rafts  or  boats  for  the  passage  of  the  in- 
fantry ; the  stream  at  low  water  was,  perhaps,  nearly  ford- 
able for  cavalry,  and  the  trusty  Batavians  on  his  wings  were 
accustomed  to  swim  by  their  horses’  sides  clinging  by  the 
mane  or  bridle,  across  the  waters,  not  less  wide  and  rapid,  of 
their  native  Rhine.  Still  the  traject  must  have  been  perilous 
enough,  even  if  unopposed.  But  now  the  further  bank  was 
thronged  with  the  Britons  in  dense  array,  while  between 
their  ranks,  the  women,  clad  in  black  and  with  hair  dis- 
hevelled, rushed  like  furies  with  flaming  torches,  and  behind 
them  were  seen  the  Druids  raising  their  hands  to  heaven,  in- 

1 Lucan  iii.  423, — 

“ Medio  cum  Phoebus  in  axe  est, 

Aut  coelum  nox  atra  tenet,  pavet  ipse  sacerdos 
Accessus,  dominumque  timet  deprendere  luci.” 

2 Segontium  is  the  modem  Caernarvon.  There  is  every  appearance  of 
great  changes  having  taken  place  in  the  line  of  coast  in  this  neighbourhood. 


A.  U.  814.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


43 


yoking  curses  on  the  daring  invaders.  The  Romans  were  so 
dismayed  at  the  sight  that,  as  they  came  to  land,  they  at 
first  stood  motionless  to  he  struck  down  by  every  assailant. 
But  this  panic  lasted  but  for  a moment.  Recalled  by  the 
cries  of  their  chiefs  to  a sense  of  discipline,  of  duty,  of  danger, 
they  closed  their  ranks,  advanced  their  standards,  struck, 
broke  and  trampled  on  the  foe  before  them,  and  applied  his 
own  torches  to  his  machines  and  waggons.  The  rout  was 
complete ; the  fugitives,  flung  back  by  the  sea,  had  no  further 
place  of  retreat.  The  island  was  seamed  with  Roman  en- 
trenchments, the  groves  cut  down  or  burnt,  and  every  trace 
speedily  abolished  of  the  foul  rites  by  which  Hesus  had  been 
propitiated,  or  the  will  of  Taranus  consulted.1 

From  this  moment  the  Druids  disappear  from  the  page  of 
history ; they  were  exterminated,  we  may  believe,  upon  their 
own  altars;  for  Suetonius  took  no  half  measures.  DiSCOntentof 
But  whatever  were  his  further  designs  for  the  the  Icem- 
final  pacification  of  the  province,  they  were  interrupted  by 
the  sudden  outbreak  of  a revolt  in  his  rear.  The  Iceni,  as 
has  been  said,  had  submitted,  after  their  great  overthrow,  to 
the  yoke  of  the  invaders:  their  king  Prasutagus  had  been 
allowed  indeed  to  retain  his  nominal  sovereignty ; but  he  was 
placed  under  the  control  of  Roman  officials ; his  people  were 
required  to  contribute  to  the  Roman  treasury:  their  com- 
munities were  incited  to  a profuse  expenditure  which  ex- 
ceeded their  resources ; while  the  exactions  imposed  on  them 
were  so  heavy  that  they  were  compelled  to  borrow  largely, 
and  entangle  themselves  in  the  meshes  of  the  Roman  money- 
lenders. The  great  capitalists  of  the  city,  wealthy  courtiers, 
and  prosperous  freedmen,  advanced  the  sums  they  called  for 
at  exorbitant  interest ; from  year  to  year  they  found  them- 
selves less  able  to  meet  their  obligations,  and  mortgaged 
property  and  person  to  their  unrelenting  creditors.  Among 
the  immediate  causes  of  the  insurrection  which  followed,  is 
mentioned  the  sudden  calling  in  by  Seneca,  the  richest  of 


Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  30. 


44 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  61. 


philosophers,  of  the  large  investments  he  had  made,  which 
he  seemed  in  danger  of  losing  altogether.1 

But  the  oppression  of  the  Homans  was  not  confined  to 
these  transactions.  Prasntagns,  in  the  hope  of  propitiating 
insurrection  of  provincial  government  to  his  family,  had  be- 

the  iceni.  queathed  his  dominions  to  the  republic.  He  ex- 
pected perhaps  that  his  wife  and  his  children,  who  were  also 
females,  if  not  allowed  to  exercise  even  a nominal  sovereignty 
after  him,  would  at  least  be  treated  in  consequence  with  the 
respect  due  to  their  rank,  and  secured  in  the  enjoyment  of 
ample  means  and  consideration.  This  was  the  fairest  lot  that 
remained  to  the  families  of  the  dependent  chieftains,  and  the 
Romans  had  not  often  grudged  it  them.  But  an  insolent 
official,  placed  in  charge  of  these  new  acquisitions  after  the 
death  of  Prasutagus,  forgot  what  was  due  to  the  birth  and 
even  the  sex  of  the  wretched  princesses.  He  suspected  them, 
perhaps,  of  secreting  a portion  of  their  patrimony,  and  did 
not  scruple  to  employ  stripes  to  recover  it  from  the  mother, 
while  he  surrendered  her  tender  children  to  even  worse  indig- 
nities. Boadicea,  the  widowed  queen  of  the  Iceni,  was  a 
woman  of  masculine  spirit.  Far  from  succumbing  under  the 
cruelty  of  her  tyrants  and  hiding  the  shame  of  her  family, 
she  went  forth  into  the  public  places,  showed  the  scars  of  her 
wounds,  and  the  fainting  forms  of  her  abused  daughters,  and 
adjured  her  people  to  a desperate  revenge.  The  Iceni  were 
stung  to  frenzy  at  their  sovereign’s  wrongs,  at  their  own 
humiliation.  The  danger,  the  madness,  of  the  attempt  was 
considered  by  none  for  a moment.  They  rose  as  one  man : 
there  was  no  power  at  hand  to  control  them:  the  Roman 
officials  fled,  or,  if  arrested,  were  slaughtered;  and  a vast 
multitude,  armed  and  unarmed,  rolled  southward  to  over- 
whelm and  extirpate  the  intruders.  To  the  Colne,  to  the 
Thames,  to  the  sea,  the  country  lay  entirely  open.  The 
legions  were  all  removed  to  a distance,  the  towns  were  un- 
enclosed, the  Roman  traders  settled  in  them  were  untrained 

1 Dion,  lxii.  2.  Dion  is  ill-natured ; yet  I do  not  think  he  can  have  invented 
this  story ; and  Brutus  had  done  the  like. 


A.  U.  814.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


45 


to  arms.  Even  the  Claudian  colony  was  undefended.  The 
procurator,  Catus  Decianus,  was  at  the  moment  absent,  and 
being  pressed  for  succour,  could  send  no  more  than  two 
hundred  soldiers  for  its  protection.  Little  reliance  could  be 
placed  on  the  strength  of  a few  worn-out  veterans:  the 
natives,  however  specious  their  assurances,  were  not  unjustly 
distrusted,  for  they  too,  like  the  Iceni,  had  suffered  insolence 
and  ill-treatment.  The  great  temple  of  Claudius  was  a stand- 
ing monument  of  their  humiliation : for  its  foundation  their 
estates  had  been  confiscated,  for  its  support  their  tribute  was 
required,  and  they  regarded  as  victims  or  traitors  the  native 
chiefs  who  had  been  enrolled  in  its  service.  Whatever  alarm 
they  might  feel  at  the  indiscriminate  fury  of  the  hordes  de- 
scending upon  them,  they  smiled  grimly  at  the  panic  which 
more  justly  seized  the  Romans.  The  guilty  objects  of  na- 
tional vengeance  discovered  the  direst  prodigies  in  every 
event  around  them.  The  wailings  of  their  women,  the 
neighing  of  their  horses,  were  interpreted  as  evil  omens. 
Their  theatre  was  said  to  have  resounded  with  uncouth 
noises ; the  buildings  of  the  colony  had  been  seen  inversely 
reflected  in  the  waters  of  their  estuary;  and  at  ebb-tide 
ghastly  remains  of  human  bodies  had  been  discovered  in  the 
ooze.1  Above  all,  the  statue  of  Victory,  planted  to  face  the 
enemies  of  the  republic,  had  turned  its  back  to  the  advancing 
barbarians  and  fallen  prostrate  before  them.  When  the  col- 
onists proposed  to  throw  up  hasty  entrenchments  they  were 
dissuaded  from  the  work,  or  impeded  in  it  by  the  natives, 
who  persisted  in  declaring  that  there  was  no  cause  for  fear ; 


and  the  treachery  of  the  Trinobantes  no  longer  capture  of  Cam 
doubtful,  that  they  retreated  tumultuously  with-  ° UDU 
in  the  precincts  of  the  temple,  and  strengthened  its  slender 
defences  to  support  a sudden  attack  till  succour  could  arrive. 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  32. : “ Yisam  speciem  in  asstuario  Tamesae  subversae  colo- 
niae.”  The  “ estuary  of  the  Thames  ” may  comprise  the  whole  extent  of  the 
deep  indentation  of  the  coast  between  Landguard  Point  and  the  North  Fore- 
land. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  61. 


But  the  impetuosity  of  the  assault  overcame  all  resistance. 
The  stronghold  was  stormed  on  the  second  day,  and  all  who 
had  sought  refuge  in  it,  armed  and  unarmed,  given  up  to 
slaughter.1 * * * * * 

Meanwhile  the  report  of  this  fearful  movement  had  trav- 
elled far  and  wide  through  the  country.  It  reached  Petilius 
Cerialis,  the  commander  of  the  Ninth  legion, 

Suetonius  hast-  i • -t  0 , 7 

ens  to  retrieve  which  I suppose  to  have  been  stationed  near  the 
the  disaster.  -y^ash,  and  he  broke  up  promptly  from  his  camp 

to  hang  on  the  rear  of  the  insurgents.  It  reached  the 
Twentieth  legion  at  Deva,  which  awaited  the  orders  of  Sue- 
tonius himself,  as  soon  as  he  should  learn  on  the  banks  of  the 
Menai  the  perils  in  which  the  province  was  involved.  The 
prefect  withdrew  the  Fourteenth  legion  from  the  smoking 
groves  of  Mona,  and  urged  it  with  redoubled  speed  along 
the  highway  of  Watling  Street,  picking  up  the  best  troops 
from  the  Twentieth  as  he  rushed  by,  and  summoning  the 
Second  from  Isca  to  join  him  in  the  South.  But  Pamius 
Postumus,  who  commanded  this  latter  division,  neglected  to 
obey  his  orders,  and  crouched  in  terror  behind  his  fortifica- 
tions. The  Iceni  turned  boldly  on  Cerialis,  who  was  hang- 
ing close  upon  their  heels,  and  routed  his  wearied  battalions 
with  great  slaughter.  The  infantry  of  the  Ninth  legion  was 
cut  in  pieces,  and  the  cavalry  alone  escaped  to  their  entrench- 
ments.1 But  the  barbarians  had  not  skill  nor  patience  to  con- 
duct the  siege  of  a Roman  camp.  They  left  the  squadron  of 
Cerialis  unmolested,  nor  did  they  attempt  to  force  the  scat- 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  31,  32. ; Agric.  16. : “Nec  ullum  in  barbaris  saevitiae  ge- 
nus omisit  ira  et  victoria.”  The  atrocities  inflicted  on  the  captives  are  de- 

scribed in  horrid  detail  by  Dion,  lxii.  1-7. ; rag  yap  ywaiKag  rag  evyevEcrdrag 

Kai  evTcpeTT  ear  drag  yvpvag  EKpepaaav , Kai  rovg  te  pacrovg  avruv  TrspiirEpov, 

kcu  roig  ordpaoi  c<j)d)V  'KpooEppairTcrv , oirug  ug  Kai  Ecdiovaai  avrovg  bpipvro'  Kai 
gsra  tovto  'Kaaaakoig  bt-koi  6ia  navTog  rov  cdparog  Kara  prjKog  avenEipav.  In 

the  immediate  neighbourhood  of  Colchester  a skeleton  is  said  to  have  been 

found  which,  from  the  implements  lying  by  it,  seems  to  have  been  that  of  a 
Roman  priest,  buried  head  downwards : Kai  ravra  izavra , says  Dion,  v6p'i£ovTsg. 

1 The  site  of  this  battle  has  been  assigned,  with  some  probability,  from  the 
great  tumulus  at  that  spot,  to  Wormingford,  six  miles  north  of  Colchester. 


A.  U.  814.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


47 


tered  posts  around  them.  After  giving  Camulodunum  to 
the  flames,  they  dispersed  throughout  the  country,  plunder- 
ing and  destroying.  Suetonius,  unappalled  by  the  frightful 
accounts  which  thronged  upon  him,  held  on  his  course  stead- 
fastly with  his  single  legion,  broke  through  the  scattered 
bands  of  the  enemy,  and  reached  Londinium  without  a 
check.1  This  place  was  crowded  with  Roman  residents, 
crowded  still  more  at  this  moment  with  fugitives  from  the 
country  towns  and  villas : hut  it  was  undefended  by  walls, 
its  population  of  traders  was  of  little  account  in  military 
eyes,  and  Suetonius  sternly  determined  to  leave  it,  with  all 
the  wealth  it  harboured,  to  the  barbarians,  rather  than  sacri- 
fice his  soldiers  in  the  attempt  to  save  it.2  The  policy  of  the 
Roman  commander  was  to  secure  his  communications  with 
Gaul : but  he  was  resolved  not  to  abandon  the  country,  nor 
surrender  the  detachments  hemmed  in  at  various  points  by 
the  general  rising  of  the  Britons.  The  precise  direction  of 
his  movements  we  can  only  conjecture.  Had  he  retired  to 
the  southern  bank  of  the  Thames,  he  would  probably  have 
defended  the  passage  of  that  river ; or  had  the  Britons  cross- 
ed it  unresisted,  the  historians  would  not  have  failed  to 
specify  so  important  a success.  But  the  situation  of  Camu- 
lodunum, inclosed  in  its  old  British  lines,  and  backed  by  the 
sea,  would  offer  him  a secure  retreat  where  he  might  defy 
attack,  and  await  reinforcements ; and  the  insurgents,  after 
their  recent  triumphs,  had  abandoned  their  first  conquests  to 
wreak  their  fury  on  other  seats  of  Roman  civilization.  While, 
therefore,  the  Iceni  sacked  and  burnt  first  Yerulamium,  and 
next  Londinium,  Suetonius  made,  as  I conceive,  a flank  march 
towards  Camulodunum,  and  kept  ahead  of  their  pursuit,  till 
he  could  choose  his  own  position  to  await  their  attack.  In  a 
valley  between  undulating  hills,  with  woods  in  the  .rear,  and 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  33.:  “At  Suetonius  mira  constantia  medios  inter  hostes 
Londinium  perrexit.” 

2 “ Unius  oppidi  damno  servare  universa  statuit.”  Our  early  antiquarians 
could  trace  the  remains  of  a Roman  encampment  at  Islington,  which  they  sup- 
posed to  have  been  the  quarters  of  Suetonius  at  this  moment. 


48 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  61. 


the  ramparts  of  the  British  oppidum  not  far  perhaps  on  his 
right,  he  had  every  advantage  for  marshalling  his  slender 
forces;  and  these  were  increased  in  number  more  than  in 
strength  by  the  fugitives  capable  of  bearing  arms,  whom  he 
allowed  to  cling  to  his  fortunes.1  Ten  thousand  resolute 
men  drew  their  swords  for  the  Roman  Empire  in  Britain. 
The  natives,  many  times  their  number,  spread  far  and  wide 
over  the  plain ; but  they  could  assail  the  narrow  front  of  the 
Romans  with  only  few  battalions  at  once,  and  the  waggons, 
which  conveyed  their  accumulated  booty  and  bore  their  wives 
and  children,  thronged  the  rear,  and  cut  off  almost  the  possi- 
bility of  retreat. 

But  flushed  with  victory,  impatient  for  the  slaughter, 
animated  with  desperate  resolution  to  die  or  conquer,  the 
Defeat  of  the  Britons  cast  no  look  or  thought  behind  them, 
icem.  Boadicea  drove  her  car  from  rank  to  rank,  from 

nation  to  nation,  with  her  daughters  beside  her,  attesting  the 
outrage  she  had  endured,  the  vengeance  she  had  already 
taken,  proclaiming  the  gallant  deeds  of  the  queens  before 
her,  under  whom  British  warriors  had  so  often  triumphed, 
denouncing  the  intolerable  yoke  of  Roman  insolence,  and 
declaring  that  whatever  the  men  might  determine,  the  women 
would  now  be  free  or  perish.  The  harangue  of  Suetonius,  on 
the  other  hand,  was  blunt  and  sarcastic.  He  told  his  men  not 
to  mind  the  multitudes  before  them,  nor  the  noise  they  made  : 
there  were  more  women  among  them  than  men : as  for  their 
own  numbers,  let  them  remember  that  in  all  battles  a few 
good  swordsmen  really  did  the  work ; the  half-armed  and 
dastard  crowds  would  break  and  fly  when  they  felt  again  the 
prowess  of  the  Roman  veterans.  Thus  encouraged,  the 
legionaries  could  with  difficulty  be  restrained  to  await  the 

1 Tac.  1.  c. : “ Comitantes  in  partem  agminis  acceperat.”  I am  indebted  to 
the  Rev.  Mr.  Jenkins,  of  Stanway,  near  Colchester,  for  this  conjecture  with  re- 
gard to  the  direction  of  the  march,  and  the  site  of  the  battle.  His  views  are 
explained  in  a tract  in  the  Archceologia,  1842  ; and  I may  refer  the  reader  to 
some  further  remarks  upon  them  in  the  Quarterly  Review , vol.  xcvii.  His 
speculations,  I may  add,  have  been  of  the  highest  value  to  me,  though  I must 
be  content  sometimes  to  follow  them  “ non  passibus  sequis.” 


A.U.  814.] 


UXDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


49 


onset ; and  as  soon  as  the  assailants  had  exhausted  their 
missiles,  bore  down  upon  them  in  the  wedge-shaped  column, 
which  had  so  often  broken  Greeks,  Gauls  and  Carthaginians. 
The  auxiliaries  followed  with  no  less  impetuosity.  The 
horsemen,  lance  in  hand,  pierced  the  ranks  which  still  kept 
their  ground.  But  a single  charge  was  enough.  The  Britons 
were  in  a moment  shattered  and  routed.  In  another  mo- 
ment, the  Romans  had  reached  the  wide  circumvallation  of 
waggons,  among  which  the  fugitives  were  scrambling  in 
dismay,  slew  the  cattle  and  the  women  without  remorse,  and 
traced  with  a line  of  corpses  and  carcases  the  limits  of  the 
British  position.  We  may  believe  that  the  massacre  was 
enormous.  The  Romans  declared  that  80,000  of  their  enemies 
perished,  while  of  their  own  force  they  lost  only  400  slain, 
and  about  as  many  wounded.  Boadicea  put  an  end  to  her 
life  by  poison  : we  could  have  wished  to  hear  that  the  brave 
barbarian  had  fallen  on  a Roman  pike.  Suetonius  had  won 
the  greatest  victory  of  the  imperial  history ; to  complete  his 
triumph,  the  coward,  Postumus,  who  had  shrunk  from  aiding 
him,  threw  himself,  in  shame  and  mortification,  on  his  own 
sword.1 

By  this  utter  defeat  the  British  insurrection  was  par- 
alyzed. Throughout  the  remainder  of  the  season  the  Romans 
kept  the  field ; they  received  reinforcements  from 

A . Pinal  suppres- 

the  German  camps,  and  their  scattered  cohorts  sion  of  the  in- 
were  gradually  brought  together  in  a force 
which  overawed  all  resistance.  The  revolted  districts  were 
chastised  with  fire  and  sword,  and  the  systematic  devasta- 
tion inflicted  upon  them,  suffering  as  they  already  were  from 
the  neglect  of  tillage  during  the  brief  intoxication  of  their 
success,  produced  a famine  which  swept  off  the  seeds  of 
future  insurrections.  On  both  sides  a fearful  amount  of  de- 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  34-87. ; Agric.  16.  Dion,  lxii.  12.  From  the  slender 
accounts  we  have  received  of  this  outbreak  it  would  seem  to  have  been  confined 
to  the  Iceni,  which  makes  it  the  more  probable  that  these  people  were  a differ- 
ent race  from  the  Celtic  Britons.  Their  numbers  as  indicated  by  Dion,  and 
even  by  Tacitus,  deserve  little  reliance. 

VOL.  vi. — 4 


50 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  61. 


struction  had  been  committed.  Amidst  the  overthrow  of 
the  great  cities  of  southern  Britain,  not  less  than  seventy 
thousand  Roman  colonists  had  perished.  The  work  of 
twenty  years  was  in  a moment  undone.  Far  and  wide  every 
vestige  of  Roman  civilization  was  trodden  into  the  soil.  At 
this  day  the  workmen  who  dig  through  the  foundations  of 
the  Norman  and  the  Saxon  London,  strike  beneath  them  on 
the  traces  of  a double  Roman  city,  between  which  lies  a mass 
of  charred  and  broken  rubbish,  attesting  the  conflagration  of 
the  terrible  Boadicea. 

The  temper  of  Suetonius,  as  may  be  supposed  from  what 
has  been  already  said  of  him,  was  stern  and  unbending,  even 
Succeeded  by  a 'beyond  the  ordinary  type  of  his  nation.  No 
milder  policy,  other  officer,  perhaps,  in  the  Roman  armies  could 
have  so  turned  disaster  into  victory,  and  recovered  a prov- 
ince at  a blow ; but  it  was  not  in  his  character  to  soothe 
the  conquered,  to  conciliate  angry  passions,  to  restore  the 
charm  of  moral  superiority.  Classicianus,  who  was  his  next 
procurator,  complained  of  him  to  the  emperor,  as  wishing  to 
protract  hostilities  when  every  end  might  be  obtained  by 
conciliation.  A freedman  of  the  court,  named  Polycletus, 
was  sent  on  the  delicate  mission,  to  judge  between  the  civil 
and  the  military  chief,  and  to  take  the  measures  most  fitting 
for  securing  peace  and  obedience.  Polycletus  brought  with 
him  a large  force  from  Italy  and  Gaul,  and  was  no  less  sur- 
prised perhaps  than  the  legions  he  commanded,  to  see  him- 
self at  the  head  of  a Roman  army.  Even  the  barbarians,  we 
are  told,  derided  the  victorious  warriors  who  bowed  in  sub- 
mission to  the  orders  of  a bondman.  But  Polycletus  could 
make  himself  obeyed  at  least,  if  not  respected.  The  loss  of  a 
few  vessels  on  the  coast  furnished  him  with  a pretext  for  re- 
moving Suetonius  from  his  command,  and  transferring  it  to 
a consular,  Petronius  Turpilianus,  whose  temper  and  policy 
inclined  equally  to  peace.1 

1 Tacitus,  as  an  admirer  of  Trajan,  can  never  forego  a gibe  at  captains  who 
preferred  the  conquests  of  peace  to  those  of  warfare.  Of  this  Turpilianus  he 
says : “Is  non  irritato  hoste,  neque  lacessitus,  honestum  pads  nomen  segni  otio 
imposuit.” — Ann.  xiv.  39. 


A.  U.  814.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


51 


From  the  lenity  of  this  propraetor  the  happiest  conse- 
quences evidently  ensued.  The  southern  Britons  acquiesced 
in  the  dominion  of  Rome,  while  the  northern 

. . Happy  effects 

were  awed  into  deference  to  her  superior  influ-  of  this  policy, 

x and  rapid  pro- 

ence.  Her  manners,  her  arts,  her  commerce,  gress  of civiiiza- 

. . . n _ tion  in  Britain. 

penetrated  iar  into  regions  yet  unconquered  by 
the  sword.  Her  establishments  at  Londinium,  Verulamium, 
and  Camulodunum  rose  again  from  their  ashes.  Never  was 
the  peaceful  enterprise  of  her  citizens  more  vigorous  and 
elastic  than  at  this  period.  The  luxuries  of  Italy  and  the 
provinces,  rapidly  increasing,  required  the  extension  to  the 
utmost  of  all  her  resources.  Manufactures  and  commerce 
were  pushed  forward  with  unexampled  activity.  The  prod- 
ucts of  Britain,  rude  as  they  were,  consisting  of  raw  mate- 
rials chiefly,  were  demanded  with  an  insatiable  appetite  by 
the  cities  of  Gaul  and  Germany,  and  exchanged  for  arts  and 
letters,  which  at  least  decked  her  servitude  with  silken  fet- 
ters. The  best  of  the  Roman  commanders, — and  there  were 
some,  we  may  believe,  among  them  both  thoughtful  and 
humane, — while  they  acknowledged  they  had  no  right  to 
conquer,  yet  believed  that  their  conquests  were  a blessing. 
The  best  of  the  native  chiefs, — and  some  too  of  them  may 
have  wished  for  the  real  happiness  of  their  countrymen, — 
acknowledged,  perhaps,  that  while  freedom  is  the  noblest 
instrument  of  virtue,  it  only  degrades  the  vicious  to  the  low- 
est depths  of  barbarism. 


library 

UNWERbdY  OF  ILUNOIS 


52 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


CHAPTER  LII. 


THE  FAMILY  OP  TITE  DOMITII. — EARLY  YEARS  OF  NERO. — HIS  EDUCATION  UNDER 
SENECA. — STRUGGLE  FOR  INFLUENCE  OYER  HIM  BETWEEN  THE  SENATE,  HIS 
TUTOR,  AND  HIS  MOTHER. — HE  MAKES  A FAVOURABLE  IMPRESSION  AT  THE  COM- 
MENCEMENT OF  HIS  REIGN. — HIS  INTRIGUE  WITH  ACTE  AND  GRADUAL  PROGRESS 
IN  VICE. — BEHAVIOUR  OF  AGRIPPINA  AND  SENECA. — PRAISE  OF  HIS  CLEMENCY. — 
DISGRACE  OF  PALLAS. — MURDER  OF  BRITANNICUS. — DIVISION  BETWEEN  NERO 
AND  AGRIPPINA. — INTRIGUES  AGAINST  HER. — CONSECRATION  OF  A TEMPLE  TO 
CLAUDIUS. — FAVOURABLE  CHARACTERISTICS  OF  NERO’S  EARLY  GOVERNMENT.— 
HIS  FINANCIAL  AND  LEGISLATIVE  MEASURES. — THE  “ QUINQUENNIUM  NERONIS.” 

—a.  d.  54-59.  a.  u.  807-8 12. 


PECULIAR  interest  attaches  to  the  history  of  the 


Romans  through  the  greater  part  of  its  course,  from 
Family  charac-  precision  with  which  we  can  trace  the  character 

mitif  the  an-"  °f  families,  descending  often  with  the  same  un- 
cestors  of  Nero.  mistakeable  lineaments  from  father  to  son,  for 
many  generations.  We  mark  the  pride  of  the  Claudii;  the 
turbulence  of  the  Lepidi ; the  cool  selfishness  of  the  Pompeii. 
There  is  no  more  striking  analogy  between  Roman  and 
English  history  than  this : it  is  only  an  aristocracy  that  can 
present  us  with  a family  history  of  public  interest.  The 
great  men  of  democratic  Athens  stand  out  alone:  no  one 
cares  to  ask  who  were  their  fathers,  or  whether  they  left  any 
sons.  Had  they  sprung  every  one  from  the  earth,  as  they 
fancifully  boasted  of  their  nation,  their  career  and  character 
could  not  have  been,  to  all  appearance,  more  independent  of 
family  antecedents.  So  strongly,  however,  were  the  features 
of  the  Roman  family  traced  by  the  hereditary  training  of  its 
members,  that  though  the  descent  of  blood  was  often  inter- 
rupted by  the  practice  of  adoption,  the  moral  aspects  of  its 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


53 


character  were  still  broadly  but  clearly  preserved,  and  it  be- 
comes of  little  importance  to  ascertain,  in  each  particular 
instance,  whether  the  race  was  actually  continued  by  natural 
succession,  or  interpolated  by  a legal  fiction.  The  hereditary 
traditions  of  the  Scipios  were  reflected  faithfully  in  the  legal 
representatives  of  their  house,  though  some  of  the  greatest 
of  the  name  were  not  really  connected  by  ties  of  affinity  with 
one  another.  It  was  enough  that  the  sentiment  of  connexion 
was  preserved  by  the  link  of  the  domestic  cult,  and  the  com- 
mon inheritance  of  the  family  honours.  It  had  been  re- 
marked, however,  of  the  patrician  Claudii  that  numerous  as 
their  branches  were,  none  of  them  down  to  the  time  of 
Tiberius  Claudius  the  emperor,  had  ever  been  reduced  to  the 
necessity  of  perpetuating  itself  by  adoption;  and  many 
others,  no  doubt,  of  the  chief  Roman  houses  had  preserved 
their  blood-descent  equally  unbroken.1  Such  unquestionably 
had  been  for  many  generations  the  boast  of  some,  at  least, 
of  the  Domitii.  The  stock  from  which  the  emperor  Nero 
sprang  may  be  traced  back  from  son  to  father  for  about  two 
hundred  years.  The  Domitian  gens  was  widely  spread  and 
illustrious  in  every  branch.  An  Afer,  a Marsus,  a Celer,  a 
Calvinus,  had  all  obtained  distinction  in  one  or  other  of  the 
various  careers  which  courted  the  buoyant  energy  of  the 
Roman  aristocracy.  But  of  these  houses  none  was  so  full  of 
honours  as  that  of  the  Ahenobarbi,  the  progenitors  of  the 
emperor  N ero.  It  was  illustrious  for  the  high  public  part  it 
played  through  several  generations ; illustrious  for  its  wealth 
and  consideration,  for  its  native  vigour  and  ability,  but 
execrable  at  the  same  time  above  every  other  for  the  com- 
bination of  ferocity  and  faithlessness  by  which  its  representa- 
tives were  successively  distinguished.  The  founder  of  the 
race,  according  to  Suetonius,  was  a Lucius  Domitius,  to 
whom  the  Dioscuri  announced  the  victory  of  Regillus,  chang- 
ing his  beard  from  black  to  red  in  token  of  the  divine 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xii.  25.  “ Adnotabant  periti  nullam  antehac  adoptionem  inter 

patricios  Claudios  reperiri,  eosque  ab  Atto  Clauso  continuos  duravisse.”  Comp. 
Suet.  Claud.  39. 


54 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


manifestation.  Thenceforth  the  name  of  Ahenobarbi,  the 
Red  or  Brazen  beards,  was  common  to  the  family,  and  they 
inherited,  it  was  piously  believed,  the  complexion  as  regu- 
larly as  the  name.  Time  went  on,  and  the  Red-beards  en- 
joyed seven  consulships  : one  of  them  filled  the  office  of  cen- 
sor : the  house  was  raised  from  the  Plebs  to  the  Patriciate. 
From  Cnseus  Domitius  Ahenobarbus,  consul  in  632,  the  con- 
queror of  the  Allobroges,  we  have  the  descent  complete. 
The  son  of  this  victorious  imperator  was  chief  pontiff  and 
censor  in  662  ; his  temper  was  violent  and  his  public  conduct 
austere.  No  wonder , said  of  him  the  refined  and  graceful 
Crassus,  that  his  heard  is  of  brass , for  his  mouth  is  of  iron 
and  his  heart  of  lead.  The  grandson  was  consul  in  667,  and 
being  joined  in  marriage  to  a daughter  of  Cinna,  took  the 
side  of  the  Marians  in  the  first  civil  wars.  The  great  grand- 
son, Lucius,  has  been  signalized  in  these  pages  as  an  up- 
holder of  the  Optimates  against  Caesar,  the  son-in-law  and 
representative  of  Cinni,  and  therefore  against  his  own  father’s 
friends.  He  perished  after  a career  of  furious  partizanship, 
disgraced  with  cruelty  and  treachery,  on  the  field  of  Phar- 
salia.  The  fifth  in  descent,  a Cnaeus,  for  the  praenomen  gen- 
erally alternated,  was  the  follower  of  Brutus  and  Cassius, 
sided  afterwards  with  their  foe  Antonius,  and  finally  desert- 
ed his  falling  fortunes  for  the  luckier  star  of  Octavius.1  The 
sixth  was  Lucius  Domitius,  who  crossed  the  Elbe  with  a 
Roman  army,  a man  to  be  noted  in  the  military  annals  of  his 
country,  but  whose  temper  was  as  savage  as  his  grand- 
father’s, and  his  tastes  so  sanguinary  that  Augustus  was 
compelled  to  cheek  the  bloodshed  of  his  gladiatorial  shows. 
The  son  of  Lucius,  the  seventh  in  direct  succession,  was  in- 
famous for  crimes  of  every  kind ; for  murder  and  treason,  for 
adultery  and  incest.  He  was  mean  as  well  as  cruel,  and 
even  stooped  to  enrich  himself  by  petty  pilfering.  Towards 
the  end  of  Tiberius’s  reign  he  was  subjected  to  a charge  of 
Majesty,  and  would  have  perished,  but  for  the  opportune 

1 Yet  this  Domitius,  according  to  Suetonius,  was  “ by  far  the  best  ” of  his 
race.  Suet.  Ner.  2. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


55 


demise  of  the  emperor.  Married  to  Agrippina,  the  sister  of 
Cains  Caligula,  he  became  the  father  of  Lucius  Domitius, 
afterwards  Nero.  He  made  a jest  of  his  own  enormities; 
and  it  was  reported  at  least,  that  on  the  child’s  birth  he  re- 
plied to  the  felicitations  of  his  friends  by  grimly  remarking, 
that  nothing  could  spring  from  such  a father  and  such  a 
mother  but  what  should  be  abominable  and  fatal  to  the 
state.1 

The  commencement  of  the  future  emperor’s  career  was 
clouded  with  perils  and  disasters.  At  the  age  of  three  years 
he  lost  his  father’s  protection,  and  Caius,  to 

A 7 . Misfortunes  of 

whom,  by  way  of  precaution,  two  thirds  of  his  Nero’s  early 
patrimony  had  been  bequeathed,  shamelessly  year&’ 
grasped  the  remainder  also.  The  child  thus  despoiled,  and 
rendered  doubly  an  orphan  by  the  exile  of  his  mother,  was 
left  to  the  care  of  his  father’s  sister,  Domitia  Lepida.  By 
this  selfish  intriguer,  the  mother  of  Messalina,  he  seems  to 
have  been  little  cared  for ; his  first  tutors  were  a dancer  and 
a barber ; nevertheless  his  aunt  appears  to  have  considered, 
at  least  at  a later  period,  that  she  had  something  of  a 
mother’s  claims  upon  him.  Claudius,  however,  kindly  re- 
stored him  his  inheritance,  together  with  the  fortune  of 
Crispus  Passienus,  who  had  been  Agrippina’s  first  husband, 
and  was  afterwards  apparently  united  to  another  of  his 
aunts,  named  also  Domitia.2  The  favour  of  this  emperor, 

1 Suet.  JVer.  5,  6. ; Dion,  lxi.  2.  This  writer’s  history,  in  the  shape  in 
which  we  possess  it,  from  book  lv.  to  lx.  is  probably  only  an  abridgment,  the 
author  of  which  is  unknown.  From  book  lxi.  we  have  only  the  epitome  of 
Xiphilinus,  which  is  still  more  meagre  than  the  preceding,  nor  does  it  seem  to 
be  always  faithful.  It  is  often  quoted  under  the  name  of  the  abbreviator.  I 
have  thought  it,  however,  more  convenient  to  preserve  that  of  the  original 
author. 

2 Care  must  be  taken  not  to  confound  the  two  aunts  of  Nero,  Domitia  Le- 
pida, usually  known  by  her  second  name  only,  and  Domitia.  The  first  was  wife 
to  Valerius  Messala,  mother  of  Messalina,  a rival  of  Agrippina,  who  got  her 
put  to  death  by  Claudius : Tac.  Ann.  xii.  65.  The  other  was  second  wife  to 
Passienus,  and  though  also  an  object  of  jealousy  to  Agrippina,  survived  her, 
and  was  supposed  to  have  been  eventually  poisoned  by  Nero.  Suet.  Ner.  34. ; 
Dion,  lxi.  17. 


56 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


if  we  may  believe  the  rumours  of  the  day,  gained  the  child 
at  an  early  period  the  jealousy  of  Messalina;  and  he  nar- 
rowly escaped  being  smothered  by  her  emissaries  in  the  se- 
curity of  his  midday  slumber. 

From  this  epoch  his  fortunes  have  already  been  traced  to 
the  moment  of  his  accession.  The  position  of  the  young 

Domitius,  as  the  son  of  a noble  of  the  hio'hest 

His  education.  1 e 

class,  closely  allied  with  the  reigning  family,  yet 
not  directly  in  the  line  of  succession,  was  peculiarly  favour- 
able to  his  education.  The  loss  of  his  fierce  and  brutal 
father,  when  he  was  but  three  years  old,  was  certainly  no 
matter  of  regret.  The  superintendence  of  his  early  training 
would  thus  fall  exclusively  to  his  mother,  interrupted  only 
by  the  two  years  of  her  exile ; and  Agrippina  seems,  with  all 
her  faults,  to  have  had  at  least  a princely  sense  of  the  duty 
which  thus  devolved  upon  her.  The  child  was  docile  and 
affectionate,  apt  to  learn  and  eager  for  praise.  His  mother 
sought  to  imbue  his  mind  with  the  best  learning  of  the  times, 
and  at  the  same  time  to  impart  brilliancy  and  fascination  to 
his  manners.  It  was  the  fashion  to  complain  of  the  decline 
of  education  at  this  period  in  the  Roman  world.  Surrounded 
by  vice  and  grossness  of  all  kinds,  and  conscious  of  their  de- 
generacy in  virtue  as  well  as  their  neglect  of  decorum,  it  was 
in  the  corrupt  training  of  childhood  that  moralists  seemed  to 
discover  the  germ  of  the  evils  they  deplored.  But,  as  usual 
with  reactionists  in  social  life,  who  from  imperfect  experience 
and  sympathies  see  the  defects  only  of  the  present,  and  the 
good  only  of  the  past,  they  mistook  the  cause  of  the  disease, 
and  wasted  their  energies  in  declamations  against  an  imag- 
Compiaints  of  inary  evil.  It  was  the  complaint  of  the  day,  that 
triciln  educaP-a'  children  were  no  longer  educated  by  their  own 
tion*  mothers,  but  consigned  in  their  tenderest  years 

to  the  mercenary  supervision,  first  of  handmaids,  and  soon 
afterwards  of  pedagogues.  Such,  it  was  said,  had  not  been 
the  practice  of  Aurelia,  the  mother  of  Julius  Caesar;  of  Atia, 
the  parent  of  Octavius ; of  Cornelia,  from  whom  her  sons,  the 
Gracchi,  distinguished  for  their  eloquence,  had  imbibed  the 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


57 


rudiments  of  the  Roman  tongue.1  Yet,  according  to  the 
ancient  usage,  the  child  had  always  been  removed  from  the 
women’s  chamber  at  seven  years ; and  it  cannot  be  pretended 
that  the  training  of  the  first  seven  years  of  life  could  have 
laid  deep  the  foundations  either  of  the  moral  or  the  intellec- 
tual character.  Indeed  even  the  women,  thus  specially  men- 
tioned, were  exceptions  to  the  mass  of  the  untutored  matrons 
of  Rome.  Many  mothers  never  taught  their  children  any- 
thing up  to  the  age  of  seven,  and  it  was  not  unusual,  nor  un- 
defended by  some  on  principle,  to  leave  them  to  learn  even 
the  rudiments  of  reading  from  the  pedagogue  after  that  epoch 
was  passed.2  This  complaint,  then,  which  is  particularly 
advanced  in  the  juvenile  work  of  Tacitus  (for  as  his,  I think, 
the  Treatise  on  Orators  should  be  recognised) , was,  in  fact, 
unfounded.  The  real  quarrel,  however,  of  the  conservatives 
to  whom  he  belonged,  was  with  the  practice,  introduced  in 
the  last  age  of  the  republic,  of  sending  children  to  public 
schools,  instead  of  keeping  them  under  tutors  at  home. 
Domestic  tuition,  the  necessity  of  an  early  stage  of  society, 
seemed  more  dignified  and  aristocratic ; it  savoured  of  the 
idea  that  letters  were  a craft  and  mystery  ; that  the  learning 
of  the  noble  was  a privilege,  not  to  be  freely  communicated 
to  all  classes ; and  on  this  account,  unconsciously  perhaps,  it 
found  patrons  among  the  patriots  of  the  imperial  era,  the  up- 
holders of  every  republican  prejudice.  It  was  easy  then,  as 
now,  to  point  out  the  superficial  evils  of  public  education, 
the  conceit  and  ostentation  it  may  foster ; but  the  patrician 
clung  with  peculiar  tenacity  to  his  cherished  isolation  and 
reserve,  the  qualities  which,  in  his  view,  most  proudly  dis- 
tinguished the  high-born  Roman  from  the  Greeks,  the  Orien- 
tals, and  the  vulgar  all  over  the  world.  Whatever  tended 
to  place  the  young  noble  on  an  equality  with  other  men,  to 
imbue  him  with  liberal  feelings,  to  break  down  the  pride  of 
caste  and  the  traditions  of  antique  usage,  among  which  he 
had  been  born,  was  regarded  by  the  purists  of  the  empire 

1 Tac.  de  Orator.  28,  29. 

2 See  Quintilian,  Inst.  Orat.  i.  1.,  who,  however,  objects  to  the  practice. 


58 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


with  suspicion  and  dislike.  A society  which  had  no  other 
safeguard  hut  blind  habit,  might  naturally  be  alarmed  at 
anything  which  tended  to  innovation ; but  a few  only  of  the 
most  thoughtful  of  the  nation  perceived  the  downward  pro- 
gress of  society  around  them  ; and  even  they  too  often  mis- 
took or  misrepresented  its  causes. 

Augustus,  it  is  curious  to  remark,  discovered  means,  in 
his  usual  spirit  of  compromise,  of  reconciling  both  the  con- 
flicting systems  of  education  which  he  found  in 

Augustus  com-  . -t  , . , 

promises  be-  action.  In  his  day,  a certain  Verrius  Flaccus 

tween  public 

and  private  was  a noted  preceptor,  and  kept  a school  much 

education. 

resorted  to  by  the  young  nobility.  ihe  em- 
peror invited  this  teacher  to  undertake  the  education  of  his 
grandsons ; but  for  this  purpose  he  required  him  to  remove 
his  benches  into  the  palace  itself,  and  limit  the  number  of  his 
pupils.1  This,  indeed,  was  probably  a solitary  attempt  to  give 
to  the  children  of  the  ruling  family  the  stimulus  of  competition 
in  a class.  For  them,  with  this  exception,  the  old  haughty 
fashion  of  solitary  teaching  was,  as  far  as  we  can  learn,  still 
maintained.  The  children  of  Drusus  and  Germanicus  seem 
to  have  been  instructed  in  the  pomp  of  antique  exclusiveness, 
under  the  eye  of  pedagogues  at  home ; and  such  was  appar- 
ently the  case  with  the  young  Domitius  also. 

Tiberius  had  betrayed  a base  jealousy  of  his  grandchild 
Caius  ; but  Claudius,  still  following  the  example  of  his  illus- 
trious ancestor,  had  shown  no  disposition  to  re- 

Principles  of  . * 

education  strict  the  education  of  the  son  of  Agrippina.  It 

adopted  by  . t 

Seneca  for  bis  was  the  complaint  oi  the  day,  that  at  a more  ad- 
pupiixero.  vance^  stage,  everything  was  sacrificed  to  the 
study  of  rhetoric ; and  that  the  science  of  moral  philosophy, 
which,  in  better  times,  had  been  conjoined  with  more  practi- 
cal training,  was  now  entirely  abandoned,  as  producing  no 
immediate  and  tangible  results.  The  most  eloquent  teachers 
deserted  the  less  fashionable  branch  of  instruction,  and  the 
care  of  morals  fell  into  the  hand  of  a lower  class  of  teachers.2 


1 Suet.  De  Illustr.  Gramm.  IV. 

2 See  Quintil.  1.  c. : “ Nam  ut  lingua  primum  coepit  esse  in  quaestu,  institu- 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


59 


Yet  it  may  be  doubted  whether  this  complaint  was  generally 
well  founded ; it  is  allowed,  at  least,  that  a reaction  speedily 
followed,  and  professors  of  philosophy  w^ere  soon  found  to 
teach  the  old  course  of  ethical  speculation,  who  rejected  as 
frivolous  the  charms  of  oratory  formerly  used  to  embellish 
it.1  But  neither  the  one  fault  nor  the  other  could  be  imputed 
to  the  master  who  was  chosen,  as  we  have  seen,  to  form  the 
mind  and  unfold  the  abilities  of  the  young  Domitius.  L. 
Annaeus  Seneca,  the  son  of  the  rhetorician  Marcus,  presents 
us  with  our  completest  specimen  of  the  professed  philosopher 
of  antiquity.  He  was  neither  a statesman  who  indulged  in 
moral  speculation,  like  Cicero,  nor  a private  citizen  who  de- 
tached himself,  like  Epicurus  or  Zero,  from  the  ordinary 
duties  of  life,  to  devote  himself  to  the  pursuit  of  abstract 
truth.  To  teach  and  preach  philosophy  in  writing,  in  talking, 
in  his  daily  life  and  conversation,  was,  indeed,  the  main  ob- 
ject he  professed;  but  he  regarded  all  public  careers  as  prac- 
tical developments  of  moral  science,  and  plumed  himself  on 
showing  that  thought  may,  in  every  case,  be  combined  with 
action.  His  father,  Marcus,  in  the  course  of  a long  life  of 
successful  teaching,  may  possibly  have  amassed  a fortune; 
and  his  brother  was  adopted  by  a brilliant,  and  perhaps  a 
wealthy  declaimer.  It  is  not  unlikely,  therefore,  that  Seneca 
inherited  a good  patrimony : nevertheless  he  must  have  found 
means  of  improving  it  very  early,  if  the  story  be  true,  that 
the  emperor  Caius  had  marked  him  for  death  on  account  of 
his  possessions.  He  continued,  no  doubt,  to  make  the  most 
of  the  favour  of  the  great  and  powerful.  If,  in  his  precepts, 
he  inculcates,  with  the  Stoics,  indifference  to  worldly  advan- 
tages, the  spirit  he  illustrated  in  his  life  was  that  of  an 
earnest  man  of  business.  If  he  shrank  from  the  profession 
of  arms,  and  if  even  his  eloquence  was  confined  to  speculative 
discussions,  he  played  the  true  Homan  in  the  art  of  making 

tumque  eloquentise  donis  male  uti,  curam  morum  qui  diserti  habebantur  reli- 
querunt.  Ea  vero  destituta  infirmioribus  ingeniis  velut  praedse  fait.” 

1 Ibid. : “ Contempto  dicendi  labore,  partem  tamen  potiorem,  si  dividi  pos- 
set, retinuerunt.” 


60 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


money  beget  money.  At  a time  when  the  philosophers  fell 
too  generally  into  the  error  of  dissuading  men  from  the  toils 
and  perils  of  a public  career,  it  was  well  that  Seneca’s  pre- 
cepts were  not  too  strictly  enforced  by  his  own  practice. 
His  instructions  were,  on  the  whole,  the  best  perhaps  that 
could  at  that  time  have  been  imparted  to  a royal  pupil. 
Both  in  sentiment  and  action,  Seneca,  with  all  his  faults,  rose 
no  doubt  far  above  the  ordinary  pedagogues  of  the  day,  the 
cringing  slave,  or  the  flattering  freedman,  to  whom  the  young 
patricians  were,  for  the  most  part,  consigned.  Doubtless,  it 
was  Seneca’s  principle  of  education  to  allure,  possibly  to 
coax,  rather  than  drive,  his  pupil  into  virtue.  He  yielded  on 
many  points  in  order  to  borrow  influence  on  others.  He 
deigned  to  purchase  the  youth’s  attention  to  severer  studies, 
by  indulging  his  inclination  to  some  less  worthy  amusements. 
To  teach  Hero  eloquence  and  philosophy,  it  might  be  neces- 
sary to  connive  at  his  relaxations  in  singing,  piping,  and 
dancing.  These  were  the  recreations  to  which  he  most  ear- 
nestly devoted  himself,  in  which  he  believed  himself  to  excel, 
and  in  which  he  acquired  a tolerable  proficiency : to  make 
sonorous  verses  was  not  beyond  his  ability;  but  when  he 
harangued,  his  tutor,  we  have  seen,  was  obliged  to  compose 
his  orations  for  him.  Yet  we  might  possibly  find,  were  the 
truth  known,  that  his  abler  predecessors  had  not  trusted,  in 
their  first  juvenile  efforts,  entirely  to  their  own  abilities. 
The  attainments  just  mentioned  would,  no  doubt,  be  frivol- 
ous in  any  man  in  princely  station ; and,  it  must  be  added, 
that  in  a Homan  noble  they  were  worse  than  frivolous, 
branded  as  they  were  by  public  opinion,  the  opinion  at  least 
of  the  best  men,  as  culpable.  Nevertheless,  it  was  something 
to  occupy  the  mind  of  a ruler  of  millions  with  any  taste  that 
was  harmless  and  bloodless.  Even  the  morose  old  Romans 
did  not  deny  that  music  and  singing  were  humanizing  arts ; 
they  rather  protested  against  humanity  being  made  an  object 
of  instruction  at  all  to  the  lords  and  conquerors  of  man- 
kind. 

In  the  midst  however  of  creatures  and  sycophants,  and 


A.  U.  807.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


61 


the  vilest  instruments  of  his  elders’  pleasures,  the  young 
noble  could  not  fail  to  be  affected  by  the  most 

_ • i i Vicious  moral 

fatal  influences.  From  childhood  he  was  steep-  training  of  the 

__  . ......  . n . i young  nobles. 

ed  m enervating  indulgences:  the  softness  with 
which  he  was  habitually  treated,  the  delicacies  with  which 
he  was  pampered,  relaxed  the  nerves  both  of  his  mind  and 
body.2  Clothed  in  purple  and  the  gaudiest  trappings,  he  was 
imbued  with  the  vice  of  personal  ostentation,  and  led  step  by 
step  to  the  most  inordinate  desires.3  The  growing  youth  re- 
clined indolently  on  beds  of  down.4  His  palate,  in  the  phrase 
of  Quintilian,  was  educated  before  his  lips  and  tongue : the 
sensual  tastes  were  cultivated  before  the  moral.5  The  kitchen 
was  more  frequented  than  the  lecture  room.6  Impertinence 
and  immodesty  were  encouraged,  the  one  by  applause,  the 
other  by  example.7  The  child  soon  followed  his  father  to  the 
theatres  and  the  circus,  the  schools  of  all  that  was  exciting  to 
the  worst  passions ; and,  under  the  stimulus  thus  prematurely 
given,  learnt  to  be  a man  before  he  had  experienced  the  pre- 
paratory training  of  boyhood.8 

The  feelings  with  which  the  youthful  heir  to  the  purple 
may  generally  be  supposed  to  have  entered  on  his  succession, 
are  picturesquely  described  by  the  poet  Statius.  Peri]s  which 
The  child  of  the  Persian  Achoemenes  balances , in  youngemperor. 
joy  and  fear , the  pleasures  and  the  risks  of  sov - a.  d 54. 

ereignty : Will  his  nobles  continue  faithful?  807. 


1 Quintil.  i.  2.:  “Nostros  amicos,  nostros  concubinos  vident;  omne  convi- 
vium  obscoenis  cantilenis  strepit ; pudenda  dictu  spectantur.  Fit  ex  his  eonsue- 
tudo,  deinde  natura.” 

2 Ibid. : “ Infantiam  statim  deliciis  solvimus.  Mollis  ilia  educatio,  quam 
indulgentiam  vocamus,  nervos  omnes  et  mentis  et  corporis  frangit.” 

3 Ibid. : “ Quid  non  adultus  concupiseet  qui  in  purpuris  repit  ? ” 

4 Ibid. : “ In  lecticis  crescunt.” 

5 Ibid. : “ Ante  palatum  eorum  quam  os  instituimus.” 

6 Senec.  Ep.  95. : “ In  rhetorum  et  philosophorum  scholis  solitudo  est ; et 
quam  celebres  culinae  sunt ; quanta  circa  nepotum  focos  juventus  strepit ! ” 

7 Senec;  Const.  Sap.  41,  12.:  Tac.  de  Or  at.  29.:  “Per  quae  paulatim  im- 
pudentia  irrepsit  et  sui  alienique  contemptus.” 

8 Tac.  1.  c. : “ Histrionalis  furor  et  gladiatorum  equorumque  studia,  quibus 
occupatus  et  obsessus  animus  quantulum  loci  bonis  artibus  relinquit  ? ” 


62 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  54. 


will  his  people  obey  the  rein  f to  whom  shall  he  entrust  the 
marches  of  the  Euphrates  f who  shall  keep  for  him  the  Cas- 
pian gates f He  shrinks  from  the  mighty  bow  of  his  father, 
and  scarce  dares  to  press  his  charger:  the  sceptre  seems  too 
heavy  for  his  grasp ; his  brows  have  not  yet  grown  to  the 
compass  of  the  tiara.1  Such  was  the  constant  condition  of 
Oriental  sovereignty ; nor  need  the  description  he  materially 
modified  to  suit  the  inheritance  of  the  Caesars.  While  con- 
spiracies were  rife  against  the  reigning  emperor,  the  pre- 
sumptive heir  was  generally  regarded  with  hope  and  affec- 
tion. But  his  accession  might  at  once  direct  every  evil 
passion  against  himself;  the  senators  might  forget  their 
oaths,  the  commons  murmur  at  authority;  and  the  chiefs 
of  the  legions  on  every  frontier  might  corrupt  the  temper  of 
the  soldiers.  If  the  genius  of  Nero’s  next  predecessor  was 
not  fitted  to  dismay  him  by  the  grandeur  of  its  proportions, 
he  would  still  remember  that  he  was  the  heir  of  Augustus 
and  Julius,  that  he  had  succeeded  to  all  their  power,  with 
none  of  their  experience,  and  hut  little  of  their  abilities. 
But  it  was  within  the  palace,  and  amongst  the  members  of 
his  own  family,  that  his  perils  chiefly  lay.  Those  who  were 
nearest  to  him  might  he  the  nearest  objects  of  his  distrust 
and  apprehension.  Agrippina  and  Britannicus  were  more 
formidable  to  him  than  Suetonius  or  Corbulo.  His  best  coun- 
sellors early  warned  him  against  the  dangerous  encroach- 
ments of  the  first ; of  the  second  he  learned  to  be  jealous  at 
least  from  the  day  of  his  accession.  When  Nero  walked 
across  the  court  of  the  palace  leaning  on  the  arm  of  Burrhus, 
to  show  himself  to  the  praetorians,  and  solicit  their  support, 

1 Stat.  Theb.  viii.  286. : 

“ Sicut  Achsemenius  solium  gentesque  paternas 
Excepit  si  forte  puer,  cui  vivere  patrem 
Tutius,  incerta  formidine  gaudia  librat, 

An  fidi  proceres,  ne  pugnet  vulgus  habenis  ; 

Cui  latus  Euphratis,  cui  Caspia  limina  mandet : 

Sumere  tunc  arcus  ipsmnque  onerare  veretur 
Patris  equum ; visusque  sibi  nec  sceptra  capaci 
Sustentare  manu,  nec  adhuc  implere  tiaram.” 


A.  U.  807.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


63 


his  chief  anxiety  was  to  anticipate  the  claims  of  his  half- 
brother.  Though  admitted  himself  by  adoption  into  the 
reigning  family,  the  sacred  stock  of  the  Claudii  and  the 
Julii,  and  thus  become  in  a legal  sense  the  eldest  scion  and 
legitimate  heir  of  the  Caesarean  house,  he  felt  that  a legal 
fiction  could  not  extinguish  the  natural  sense  of  right,  and 
that  still  to  the  mass  of  the  citizens  Britannicus  must  appear 
the  true  representative  of  the  father  from  whose  loins  he 
sprang.  The  stern  self-repression  of  the  Roman  character, 
which  had  schooled  itself  to  accept  mere  legal  adoption  as 
equivalent  to  blood-descent,  had  at  length  given  way.  Na- 
ture had  reasserted  her  sway,  and  resented  in  thousands  of 
bosoms  the  recognition  of  the  child  of  Domitius  as  the  eldest 
born  of  Claudius.1 2 

Now  however,  more  than  ever,  would  the  ribald  stories 
against  the  wretched  Messalina  come  into  play.  This  was 
the  moment  when  the  sneers,  retailed  by  a later 

i 7 7 . 7 , . Struggle  for  in- 

generation,  against  the  noble,  the  hiqhborn  Brit-  fluenceover 

. i i i-i  . ._  „ Nero:  the  sen- 

anmcus,  would  have  their  deepest  significance,  ate,  the  tutor, 
These  were  the  insinuations  which  now  support- 
ed the  tottering  principle  of  the  law.  and  seemed  to  justify 
the  resolve  of  the  soldiers.  When  the  praetorians,  prepared 
perhaps  by  Burrhus,  had  taken  the  part  of  the  pretender, 
every  popular  scruple  was  speedily  repressed.  Law  and  the 
sword  had  both  declared  on  his  side ; natural  affection  or  re- 
spect, alone  arrayed  against  them,  shrank  from  the  unequal 
contest,  or  yielded  to  the  representations  speciously  palmed 
upon  it.  It  was  not  worth  while  to  contend  for  the  heritage 
of  a youth  whose  real  parentage  was  obscured  by  such  sus- 
picions. To  the  ruling  class,  at  all  events,  the  dogmas  of  the 
law  presented  a sufficient  plea  for  acquiescence : the  nobles 

1 In  the  time  of  Dion  the  superiority  of  natural  over  legal  descent  seems 
to  have  been  generally  acknowledged.  That  writer  begins  his  account  of  Ne- 
ro’s reign  by  declaring  that  Britannicus,  as  the  legitimate,  ought  to  have  suc- 
ceeded in  place  of  Nero,  the  adopted  son  (lxi.  1.) : etc  Se  6rj  rov  vo/iov,  he  adds, 
iccu  T(S  Nepwvf  6ia  ttjv  Tzoirjmv  eTcsdaXfov, 

2 Juvenal,  vi.  124.:  “Ostenditque  tuum,  generose  Britannice,  ventrem.” 


64 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  54. 


of  Rome  were  little  disposed  to  risk  their  heads  for  a senti- 
ment of  justice  or  compassion.  As  long  as  he  governed  with 
decent  respect  to  the  pretensions  of  his  nobility,  Nero  might 
regard  himself  as  secure  against  the  open  rivalry  of  Britan- 
nicus : should  he  ever  raise  the  alarm  of  the  senate,  then  in- 
deed the  scion  of  the  genuine  Claudian  stock  might  furnish 
a name  to  inscribe  on  the  banner  of  a new  revolution.  The 
senate,  with  the  instinct  of  selfish  cowardice,  fancied  itself 
strong  in  the  weakness  of  its  ruler’s  title.  The  prince’s  ad- 
visers anxious  for  their  charge,  anxious  for  themselves,  anx- 
ious also,  we  may  believe,  for  the  good  of  the  commonwealth, 
took  advantage  of  this  state  of  afiairs  to  promote  good  gov- 
ernment, to  make  it  the  interest  of  all  classes  to  maintain 
him.  But  it  was  easier  to  conciliate  the  senate  and  the  peo- 
ple than  to  secure  the  confidence  of  the  prince  himself ; to 
maintain  their  ascendancy  over  him  against  every  rival ; to 
guide  his  ardent  and  susceptible  feelings  into  safe  channels ; 
above  all,  to  supplant  the  influence  of  his  mother,  and  pre- 
vent her  from  extending  to  his  maturer  years  the  authority 
she  had  exerted  over  his  infancy.  The  woman  who  had  sub- 
verted Messalina,  who  had  murdered  Claudius,  who  had  re- 
moved from  her  path  every  rival  without  compunction,  was 
resolved  no  doubt  to  hold  fast  the  power  to  which  she  had 
waded  through  so  much  blood.  It  was  not  for  Nero  that  she 
had  plunged  into  this  sea  of  crimes ; however  she  might  dis- 
guise it  to  her  own  conscience,  her  ambition  was  for  herself 
more  than  for  her  son.  She  had  already  played  the  Imperator 
before  the  legions  in  the  camp : she  would  not  now  resign  the 
part  to  the  stripling  who  occupied  the  palace.  With  this 
view  Agrippina  now  leagued  herself  with  the  freedmen  of  the 
court,  especially  with  Pallas,  whose  immense  wealth,  whose 
craft  and  long  acquaintance  with  the  springs  of  government, 
seemed  to  make  him  a more  useful  ally  than  the  j>edantic 
philosopher,  or  the  rude  captain.  Though  all-powerful  with 
Claudius,  Pallas  seems  from  an  early  period  to  have  become 
distasteful  to  Nero,  who  had  at  least  the  merit  of  rising  above 
the  flatteries  of  slaves  and  freedmen.  Docile  as  he  was  to 


A.  U.  807.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


65 


Burrhus  and  Seneca,  and  easily  cowed  by  the  arrogance  of 
his  mother,  against  Pallas  alone  he  evinced  spirit  and  inde- 
pendence. To  Agrippina,  indeed,  he  was  still  fondly  devoted. 
The  first  act  of  his  reign  was  to  demand  fresh  honours  and 
compliments  for  her,  and  his  first  watchword,  The  best  of 
mothers , was  inspired  probably  by  genuine  affection.1  From 
the  camp  the  praetorians  bore  him  into  the  senate-house,  de- 
manding by  signs  if  not  by  words  that  he  should  be  accepted 
as  chief  of  the  state ; and  before  evening  all  the  honours  of 
empire  were  heaped  upon  him,  of  which  he  declined  alone 
the  title  of  Father  of  his  Country.  Of  the  testament  of 
Claudius  no  notice  was  taken ; nor  are  we  informed  what  its 
provisions  really  were.  Had  it  declared  Hero  the  heir,  it 
would  of  course  have  been  duly  recited.  The  ^ro  pro- 
funeral oration  of  the  deceased  was  spoken,  as  SSCoraSmfa’ 
might  be  expected,  by  his  successor  in  person ; 0Ter  Claudius- 
an  oration  which  Seneca  was  believed  to  have  composed  for 
him,  and  which  displayed  more  graces  of  style  than  could  be 
anticipated  from  the  stripling  himself.  The  mention  it  made 
of  the  late  emperor’s  birth,  and  the  triumphs  of  his  ancestors, 
was  received  with  marked  attention ; for  in  these  family  rec- 
ords the  Homans  took  a national  pride.  They  listened  with 
respect  to  the  boast  of  his  learning,  and  to  the  assertion,  time 
and  honourable  as  it  was,  that  his  reign  had  been  sullied  by 
no  external  calamity.  But  when  the  speaker  passed,  by  a 
natural  transition,  to  the  praise  of  his  wisdom  and  discretion, 
the  multitude  burst  into  laughter.  They  had  been  wont,  in 
the  exuberant  licence  of  the  forum,  to  make  Claudius  their 
butt,  and  this  scornful  humour  they  had  so  long  been  permit- 
ted to  indulge,  that  they  could  not  now  lay  it  aside  when  a 
last  act  of  tardy  justice  was  demanded  of  them.  At  the  same 
time  more  thoughtful  men  remarked  that  Hero  was  the  first 
of  their  princes  who  had  needed  help  in  making  a speech. 
It  was  a painful  token  of  the  degradation  into  which  they 
had  fallen.  If  Hero  was  but  seventeen  years  of  age,  Caesar 
declaimed  in  the  forum  at  twelve,  Augustus  at  nineteen. 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  2. ; Suet.  Ner.  9. 
yol  vi. — 5 


66 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  54. 


Tiberius  was  a practised  orator.  Caius,  the  madman,  could 
harangue  the  senate  with  grace  and  vigour ; even  Claudius 
could  speak  with  elegance  after  due  preparation.  But  Nero, 
they  remarked  with  a sigh  or  a sneer,  had  been  directed  to 
other  studies.  Sculpture  and  painting,  singing  and  driving, 
such  were  the  arts  on  which  his  sensibility  had  been  occu- 
pied ; yet  in  the  occasional  composition  of  verses  it  was  al- 
lowed that  he  had  shown  himself  not  deficient  in  the  ele- 
ments of  polite  learning.1 2 

From  the  Campus  the  orator  returned  to  the  Senate-house, 
and  expounded  to  his  nobles  the  principles  of  government  he 
had  been  taught  to  prescribe  to  himself.  They 

Favourable  im-  ° . , . 

pressionmade  were  not  offended  by  his  placing  the  authority 

by  bis  first  _ _ J ® . * 

speech  to  the  of  the  senate  on  the  same  tooting  with  the  con- 
sent of  the  soldiers  / and  he  made  a favourable 
impression  by  reminding  them  that  his  youth  had  been  impli- 
cated in  no  civil  or  domestic  discords ; he  had  no  injuries  to 
avenge,  no  enmities  to  prosecute.  He  promised  to  reject  the 
most  odious  instruments  of  preceding  administrations;  he 
would  not  affect,  like  Claudius,  to  be  the  judge  of  all  affairs 
in  person,  a pretence  which  could  only  result  in  throwing 
power  into  the  hands  of  irresponsible  assessors.  In  his  house- 
hold no  office  should  be  put  up  to  sale ; between  his  family 
and  his  people  he  would  always  scrupulously  distinguish. 
The  senate  should  retain  all  its  prescriptive  functions.  Italy 
and  the  domains  of  the  Roman  people  should  look  to  the  tri- 
bunals for  justice.  For  himself  he  would  confine  his  care  to 
the  provinces  over  which  he  was  set  to  wield  the  sword  of 
military  command.  This  speech  filled  the  senators  with 
hopes  of  a mild  administration ; they  decreed,  in  their  joy, 
that  the  harangue  should  be  engraved  on  silver,  and  recited 
annually  on  the  accession  of  the  consuls.3  At  the  same  time 
their  new  ruler  allowed  them  to  act  with  some  show  of  inde- 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  3. : “ Cselare,  pingere,  cantus  aut  regimen  equorum  exer- 
cere ; et  aliquando,  carminibus  pangendis,  inesse  sibi  elementa  doctrinas  osten- 
debat.” 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  4. ; Suet.  Ner.  10. ; Dion,  lxi.  3. 


A.  XL  807.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


67 


pendence.  They  hastened  to  profit  by  this  brief  respite  to 
flout  the  system  of  delation  from  which  they  had  so  much 
suffered.  With  this  view,  apparently,  they  repealed  the  per- 
mission Claudius  had  given  to  accept  fees  and  rewards  for 
pleading  causes.1 2  And  further,  they  relieved  the  quaestors 
designate  from  the  burden  of  exhibiting  gladiatorial  shows, 
which  the  late  emperor,  in  his  zeal  for  the  diversions  of  the 
populace,  had  laid  upon  them.  But  Agrippina  pretended  to 
complain,  as  though  it  were  meant  to  abolish  the  acts  of  her 
husband ; and  she  had  influence  enough  with  her  son  to  make 
him  convene  the  senators  within  the  walls  of  the  palace, 
where,  though  unable  to  control  their  proceedings,  she  could 
at  least  hear  their  deliberations  from  behind  a curtain.  N or 
did  she  deign  always  to  practise  even  this  slight  reserve. 
On  one  occasion,  when  an  embassy  from  Armenia  was  await- 
ing audience,  she  prepared  to  seat  herself  beside  the  emperor ; 
nor,  dismayed  though  they  were  at  this  unprecedented  arro- 
gance, did  the  courtiers  venture  to  interfere,  till  Seneca  whis- 
pered to  the  prince  to  descend  himself  and,  under  pretence 
of  filial  duty,  meet  her  at  the  foot  of  the  throne. 

Not  the  demeanour  only,  but  the  acts  of  Agrippina,  might 
now  justly  cause  alarm.  From  the  day  of  her  son’s  eleva- 
tion she  seemed  resolved  to  play  the  empress. 

fii  i . t .-i-i.  t Arrogant  be- 

She  was  borne  m the  same  litter  with  him,  or  he  haviour  of 
walked  by  her  side  while  she  proudly  rode  aloft.-2  Agrippma' 

To  mark  the  unity  of  place  and  purpose  between  herself  and 
him,  she  caused  coins  to  be  stamped,son  which  the  heads  of 
both  were  conjoined.3  She  gave  answers  to  ambassadors, 
and  sent  despatches  to  foreign  courts.4  She  directed,  with- 
out the  emperor’s  privity,  the  murder  of  M.  Silanus,  pro- 
consul  of  Asia.  This  man  was  accounted  stupid  and  harm- 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  5. : “ Ne  quis  ad  causam  orandam  mercede  aut  donis  erne* 
retur.”  At  a later  period  Nero  seems  to  have  restored  the  wiser  provisions  of 
Claudius.  See  Suet.  Ner.  17. : “ Ut  litigatores  pro  patrociniis  certam  justam- 
que  mercedem  darent.” 

2 Dion,  lxi.  3. ; Suet.  Ner.  9. 

3 See  Eckhel,  Dodr.  Numrn.  vi.  257. 


4 Dion,  1.  c 


68 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  54. 


less ; he  had  caused  no  apprehension  to  the  most  jealous 
rulers,  and  Caius  Caligula  had  been  used  to  call  him  in  con- 
tempt the  golden  sheep . But  Agrippina  feared  that  even  his 
sluggish  temper  might  be  roused  to  avenge  the  murder  of  his 
brother  Lucius,  whom  she  had  put  out  of  the  way  before,  as 
a possible  rival  to  her  son.  Marcus  Silanus  was  now  removed 
by  poison,  administered  by  her  agents,  with  hardly  an  at- 
tempt at  disguise.1  But  the  news  of  this  crime  could  not 
reach  Home  for  some  months,  and  the  destruction  of  Narcis- 
sus, whom  meanwhile  she  drove  to  death  by  cruel  treatment 
in  prison,  was  not  regarded  generally  with  disfavour.  The 
senate  and  people  were  not  yet  alarmed.  Burrhus  alone  and 
Seneca  were  startled  at  this  virtual  assumption  of  the  power 
of  life  and  death,  conceded  only  to  the  emperors  as  a state 
necessity,  and  now,  it.  was  hoped,  for  ever  abandoned  even 
by  them.  They  opposed  themselves  to  her  plans  of  personal 
Close  alliance  cruelty  and  vengeance,  and  exerted  themselves 
Burrim?1  and  in  strict  alliance,  to  undermine  the  influence  she 
against  her.  still  possessed  over  her  son.  There  was  little  in- 
deed in  common  in  the  character  of  the  two  associates. 
Burrhus  was  noted  for  his  military  bluntness,  his  sense  of 
discipline  and  decorum,  while  Seneca  was  a courtier  in  man- 
ners, and  affected  to  combine  the  man  of  the  world  with  the 
philosopher.  But  the  necessities  of  their  position  bound  them 
closely  together,  and  we  may  allow  that  both  were  equally 
disposed  to  form  their  pupil’s  mind,  as  far  as  possible,  to  vir- 
tue. They  agreed,  however,  that  a youth  of  his  temper  and 
in  his  position  could  be  but  imperfectly  trained ; and  they 
agreed  in  the  slippery  policy  of  winking  at  some  forms  of 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  1.  The  mother  of  the  two  Silani  was  a daughter  of  Julia 
and  Lucius  Paulus  (Suet.  Oct.  64.),  possibly  .Emilia  Lepida  by  name  (Suet. 
Claud.  26.) ; their  father  was  App.  Junius  Silanus,  killed  by  Claudius  (Suet. 
Claud.  29.) ; and  L.  Silanus,  one  of  the  brothers,  had  been  betrothed  to  Octa- 
via,  the  sister  of  Britannicus.  This  near  connexion  with  the  imperial  family, 
and  the  popular  mutterings  that  he  would  make  a better  successor  to  Claudius 
than  the  stripling  Nero,  moved  the  jealousy  of  Agrippina  against  him.  See 
Tac.  1.  c.  and  Ritter’s  note. 


A.  U.  807.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


G9 


vice,  or  even  enticing  him  to  them,  in  order  to  divert  him 
from  more  pernicious  foibles,  or  crimes  of  deeper  dye.1 

The  readiest  means  of  weaning  the  young  man  from  his 
childish  dependence  on  his  mother  was  to  occupy  him  with 
an  amorous  intrigue.  Nero  was  already  betroth- 

. ..  ..  - Nero’s  intrigue 

ed  to  his  half-sister  Octavia ; but  this  victim  of  with  the  freed- 

t • /v»  • woman,  Acte. 

family  policy  was  unable  to  attract  his  affections, 
which  were  still  free  for  another  engagement.  The  care  of 
his  tutors  was  directed  only  to  guard  him  from  the  fascinations 
of  noble  matrons,  and  avert  the  scandal  of  illegitimate  con- 
nexions ; and  apparently  without  attempting  to  recall  him  to 
a sense  of  duty  to  his  spouse,  they  were  well  pleased  to  see 
him  devote  himself,  with  the  ardour  of  a first  illusion,  to  the 
charms  of  a Greek  freedwoman  named  Acte.  The  confidants 
of  this  amour  were  two  companions  a little  above  his  own 
age,  Salvius  Otho,  and  Claudius  Senecio,  of  whom  the  first 
was  of  distinguished  family,  the  second  the  son  of  a freed- 
man  of  the  court ; but  both  were  notorious  profligates,  whose 
influence  with  him  his  mother  had  already  noticed,  and  tried 
in  vain  to  avert.  Their  power  seemed  confirmed  by  their 
participation  in  this  secret  (for  the  bashful  youth  still  hoped 
it  was  a secret),  and  Agrippina  was  alarmed  and  Behaviour  of 
incensed.  Instead  of  biding  the  effects  of  pos-  As^p111*1- 
session  on  a first  childish  passion,  she  proclaimed  to  all  around 
her  indignation  and  fear,  execrating  in  the  coarsest  terms  the 
freedwoman  who  dared  to  be  her  rival , the  handmaid  who 
aspired  to  be  her  daughter-in-law.  This  violence  overshot  its 
mark,  and  threw  the  frightened  and  irritated  youth  into  the 
arms  of  Seneca,  who  contrived  to  cast  a veil  over  the  intrigue, 
by  finding  a pretended  lover  for  the  object  of  his  devotion. 
The  mother  now  saw  her  mistake.  Changing  her  tactics, 
she  began  to  bid  against  the  tutor  by  still  greater  indul- 
gences, offering  her  own  bosom  for  the  secret  confidences  of 
his  passion,  her  own  apartment  for  the  gratification  of  his  im- 
patient, but  still  timid,  desires.  She  deigned  to  apologize 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  2. : “ Juvantes  invicem,  quo  facilius  lubricam  principis 
aetatem,  si  virtutem  aspemaretur,  voluptatibus  eoncessis  retinerent.” 


70 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  I).  54. 


for  her  undue  severity,  and  opened  freely  to  his  generous 
profusion  the  stores  of  her  private  coffers,  which  were  hard- 
ly inferior  to  his  own.  But  Nero  was  not  so  deceived;  his 
advisers  would  not  suffer  him  to  be  deceived.  Indeed,  such 
was  the  temper  of  Agrippina,  that  she  could  not  long  persist 
in  the  pretence  of  submission  and  indulgence,  and  Nero  was 
mortified  at  her  openly  spurning  the  presents  he  made  her, 
saying  that  he  had  nothing  to  give  which  she  had  not  herself 
given  to  him.1 

Accordingly  the  influence  of  Seneca  and  Burrhus  con- 
tinued to  rise.  The  confederates  were  far  more  wary  in  their 
proceedings.  Their  plan,  as  has  been  said,  was 

Nero’s  gradual  x ° . . 

progress  in  to  govern  JN  ero  by  yielding  to  him,  and  they  ius- 

vice— disguised  . 0 , , 

by  his  minis-  tified  to  themselves  their  tolerance  oi  his  tailings 
by  the  assurance  that  they  should  thus  save  him 
from  vices  more  odious  and  more  fatal.  The  errors  of  Nero 
assumed  gradually  a deeper  dye ; his  passions  blossomed  in 
vice,  and  bore  fruit  in  crime ; yet  the  downward  progress 
was  not  precipitate  ; it  was  susceptible  of  palliation  and  dis- 
guise ; it  lurked  long  among  the  secrets  of  the  palace,  or  was 
whispered  only  within  the  precincts  of  the  court.  High  as 
the  great  Stoic  philosopher  strained  the  principles  of  virtue 
in  his  sublimest  exhortations,  he  often  acknowledged,  in  de- 
scending to  a lower  level,  that  for  his  own  part  he  aspired 
only  to  be  not  the  worst  among  bad  men.  To  the  student , 
he  says,  who  professes  his  wish  and  hope  to  rise  to  a loftier 
grade  of  virtue , I would  answer  that  this  is  my  wish  also,  but 
I dare  not  hope  it.  I am  pre-occupied  with  vices.  All  I re- 
quire of  myself  is,  not  to  be  equal  to  the  best,  but  only  to  be 
better  than  the  bad?  He  preached,  he  owns,  more  rigidly 
than  he  practised.  But  such  confessions  must  not  be  regard- 
ed as  the  simple  outpouring  of  conscious  infirmity.  We  can- 
not doubt,  from  the  general  context  of  the  speaker’s  decla- 
mations, that  they  are  meant  to  disguise  a considerable  amount 
of  self-satisfaction  ; that  Seneca,  like  many  preachers  of  vir- 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  13. : “ Dividere  filium  quae  cuncta  ex  ipsa  haberet.” 

2 Senec.  Epist.  75.,  de  Vit.  Beat.  17. 


A.  U.  807.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


71 


tue  and  holiness,  while  he  professed  to  sigh  oyer  his  own 
weakness  on  some  points,  was  convinced  that  in  repudiating 
vices  which  were  in  truth  less  congenial  to  hiln,  he  was  soar- 
ing far  above  the  level  of  ordinary  humanity.  The  morality 
he  impressed  upon  Kero  was  such  as  this : Be  courteous  and 
moderate  ; shun  cruelty  and  repine  ; abstain  from  blood: — 
there  was  no  difficulty  in  this  to  a young  and  popular  prince, 
flattered  on  all  sides,  and  abounding  in  every  means  of  enjoy- 
ment : — Compensate  yourself  with  the  pleasures  of  youth 
without  compunction  / amuse  yourself  but  hurt  no  man.  It 
required  no  philosopher  to  give  these  lessons ; and  it  may  be 
questioned  whether  the  comparative  innocence  of  the  young 
man’s  early  indulgences  would  have  been  exchanged  for 
grosser  enormities  under  more  vulgar  tuition. 

So,  too,  the  praise  of  clemency  with  Seneca  resounds  in 
Kero’s  ears  in  the  first  year  of  his  power,  might  be  received 
with  little  emotion  by  one  who  had  not  yet  felt 

* **  Seneca’s  praise 

the  tyrant’s  inducements  to  cruelty.  He  regard-  of  Nero’s  ciem- 
ed  himself  with  complacency  in  the  glass  which,  enc7‘ 
as  Seneca  expresses  it,  was  there  set  up  to  reflect  him.  Let 
him  turn  his  eyes,  says  the  philosopher,  on  the  great  mass  of 
mankind,  wicked,  turbulent,  ready  at  any  moment  to  reduce 
the  world  to  anarchy,  could  it  only  succeed  in  breaking  the , 
imperial  yoke  imposed  on  its  evil  passions.  Let  him  reflect 
that  he  has  been  chosen  from  the  whole  race  of  man  to  enact 
the  part  of  God  upon  earth ; he  is  the  arbiter  of  life  and 
death,  of  every  fortune  and  position.  These  thousands  of 
swords , let  him  say,  which  my  Peace  retains  in  their  scab- 
bards, are  ready  to  leap  forth  at  my  nod:  what  nations  shall 
be  destroyed , or  what  removed  ; who  shall  be  freed  and  who 
enslaved  ; what  kings  shall  be  enthroned  or  dethroned ; what 
cities  built  or  razed  / all  belongs  to  my  absolute  decision. 
Possessed  of  all  this  power,  no  anger  has  impelled  me  to  the 
infliction  of  unjust  punishments  / no  youthful  heat  of  mine , 
no  rashness  or  contumacy  of  my  people,  no,  nor  yet  the  too 
common  pride  of  proving  the  extent  of  my  power, has  tempted 
me  to  wanton  violence.  This  day,  if  the  gods  require  it,  I 


72 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A,  D.  55. 


am  prepared  to  read  before  them  the  roll  of  all  the  subjects 
they  have  given  me  charge  of . . . . This,  0 Caesar,  he 
continues,  you  may  boldly  affirm , that  none  of  the  things 
which  have  fallen  into  your  hands,  have  you  by  force  or  by 
fraud  usurped.  Innocence,  the  rarest  merit  of  princes,  inno- 
cence is  yours.  You  have  your  reward.  No  man  was  ever 
so  dear  to  his  friend,  as  you  are  to  the  Roman  people. 
Henceforth  none  will  quote  the  conduct  of  the  divine  Augus- 
tus, or  the  first  years  of  Tiberius:  none  will  look  beyond 
yourself  for  an  example  of  virtue : we  shall  gauge  the  re- 
mainder of  your  principate  by  the  flavour  of  your  first  twelve- 
month ,x  From  this  last  expression  it  appears  that  the  tract 
was  composed  towards  the  end  of  Nero’s  first  year  of  govern- 
ment, and  up  to  that  period  at  least,  according  to  the  writer’s 
testimony,  his  administration  had  been  unsullied  by  cruelty 
or  any  glaring  crime.  Yet  the  evidence  of  history  cannot  be 
set  aside  which  declares  that  it  had  already  been  disgraced 
by  a deed  of  the  most  heinous  dye  ; and  whatever  might  be 
its  general  colour  thus  far,  this  deed  alone  was  enough  to 
suffuse  it  with  an  indelible  stain. 

It  would  seem  that  Agrippina’s  intrigues  to  recover  her 
influence  in  the  palace  had  met  with  little  success.  While 
still  sparing  his  mother  from  the  feelings  of  fear 

Disgrace  of  Pal-  v ° ° . 

las:  alarm  and  or  respect  which  had  not  yet  lost  all  their  force, 

menaces  of  . . . . . _ . 

Agrippina.  he  intimated  his  dissatisfaction  by  removing  the 
a.  d.  55.  favourites  on  whose  counsels  she  leaned,  or  by 
whose  hands  she  acted.  He  disgraced  Pallas, 
who  had  acted  as  the  chief  minister  of  Claudius,  and  now  de- 
manded of  the  new  emperor  a pledge  that  no  inquiry  should 
be  made  into  his  transactions  in  that  capacity ; that  all  ac- 
counts, as  he  phrased  it,  between  himself  and  the  state  should 
be  considered  as  settled.  Deprived  of  his  offices,  and  dis- 
missed from  court,  he  was  exposed  shortly  afterwards  to  a 

1 Senec.  De  dementia , i.  1. : “Principatus  tuus  ad  anni  guslum  exigitur.” 
Such  is  the  admirable  reading  elicited  by  Lipsius  from  the  MS.  ad  auguslum , 
which,  though  conjectural,  seems  sufficiently  certain. 


A.  U.  80S.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


73 


charge  of  conspiring  against  the  emperor,  from  which  Seneca 
himself  defended  him.  But  meanwhile  his  disgrace  alone 
sufficed  to  arouse  the  terrors  of  Agrippina.  Forgetting  her 
recent  dissimulation,  she  gave  vent  to  furious  menaces  and 
reproaches.  Mortified  at  the  growing  influence  of  her  son’s 
tutors,  she  had  intimated  to  him  that  it  was  to  her  he  owed 
the  empire : she  now  went  further,  and  let  him  understand 
not  less  plainly  that  she  had  the  means  of  withdrawing  it 
again.1  The  patroness  of  Pallas  declared  aloud  that  Britan- 
nicus,  now  approaching  his  fourteenth  birthday,  was  arrived 
at  manhood  :2  she  proclaimed  him  the  genuine  offspring  and 
natural  heir  of  Claudius,  and  threatened  to  divulge  openly 
the  secret  horrors  of  the  palace,  to  avow  the  iniquity  of  her 
marriage,  and  even  confess  the  murder  of  her  husband.  But 
whatever,  she  said,  were  her  crimes,  one  thing  more  she  had 
done:  she  had  preserved  the  life  of  her  stepson.  Now  she 
would  rush  with  him  to  the  camp.  The  soldiers  should  de- 
cide between  the  daughter  of  Germanicus  and  the  wretched 
Burrhus  and  Seneca,  who  presumed,  forsooth,  to  sway  the 
empire  of  the  world,  the  one  with  his  maimed  hand,  the 
other  with  his  glib  professor’s  tongue.  Thus  saying,  she 
clenched  her  hand  in  an  attitude  of  menace,  and  stormed 
with  bitter  curses,  adjuring  the  spirit  of  the  deified  Claudius, 
and  the  shades  of  the  murdered  Silani,  and  the  victims  of  all 
the  crimes  she  had  herself,  now  it  seemed  in  vain,  com- 
mitted.3 

That  Nero  should  be  alarmed  at  this  defiance  was  only 
natural:  we  cannot  doubt  that  it  now  first  impressed  him 

1 Dion,  lxi.  7. 

2 I suppose  him  to  have  been  born  in  the  first  year  of  Claudius,  the  twen- 
tieth day  of  his  reign,  i.  e.  February  12.  704.  Suet.  Claud.  27.  But  this 
writer  is  wrong  in  placing  this  date  in  the  second  consulship  of  Claudius.  Tac- 
itus, again,  is  in  error  in  saying  that  Nero  was  only  two  years  his  senior.  He 
must  have  been  the  elder  by  more  than  three  years.  See  Ann.  xii.  25. 

3 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  14. : “ Audiretur  hinc  Germanici  filia,  inde  vilis  rursus 
Burrhus  et  exul  Seneca  trunca  scilicet  manu  et  professoria  lingua  generis 
humani  regimen  expostulates.”  We  do  not  know  whether  the  “trunca 
manus”  refers  to  an  actual  mutilation,  or  is  merely  figurative. 


74 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  55. 


„ , , , with  a sense  of  the  danger  to  he  apprehended  from 

Nero’s  plea  for  ° 1 1 

the  murder  of  his  mothers  temper,  and  made  him  feel  that 
while  Britannicus  lived  his  own  life  and  throne 
were  in  her  power.1  He  had  assumed  the  purple,  as  we  have 
seen,  in  October.  Already,  before  the  end  of  the  year,  in  the 
third  month  of  his  reign,  whether  from  rising  jealousy 
towards  him,  or  from  mere  capricious  ill-humour,  he  had  in- 
sulted the  poor  child  in  the  presence  of  his  boon  companions. 
At  a supper  he  gave  during  the  Saturnalian  festival  in  De- 
cember, he  had  taken  occasion,  as  Icing  of  the  feast , to  mor- 
tify his  bashful  timidity  by  requiring  him  to  stand  up  and 
sing  before  the  company.  Even  the  half-tipsy  revellers  had 
been  shocked  at  this  indignity,  for  as  such  it  was  regarded, 
and  expressed  still  more  pointedly  their  compassion  when 
Britannicus  chanted  a lyric  stave  on  the  sorrows  of  the  dis- 
crowned and  disinherited.2  The  emperor  was  disconcerted ; 
he  began  to  brood  from  this  time  over  the  specious  claims  of 
the  pretender,  and  Agrippina’s  threats  satisfied  him  that  they 
were  really  formidable.  Yet  he  could  make  as  yet  no  public 
charge  against  him,  and  he  did  not  venture  to  command  his 
execution,  unarraigned  and  unconvicted.  He  resolved,  we 
are  assured,  to  take  him  off  privily ; and  engaged  a tribune 
of  the  guards,  named  Pollio,  to  devise  safe  and  secret  means. 
The  infamous  Locusta,  who  was  at  the  moment  in  custody 
on  a charge  of  poisoning,  was  taken  into  counsel.  All  the 
attendants  who  loved  the  poor  youth  had  long  since  been 
removed  from  about  him.  There  was  no  hand  to  intercept 
the  noxious  potions  which  were  administered  to  him  by 
his  own  tutors.  But  the  poison  seemed  to  fail  of  its  effect, 
and  Hero  grew  impatient.3  He  stormed  at  the  tribune,  he 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  18. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  15.:  “Exorsus  est  carmen,  quo  evolution  eum  sede  patria 
rebusque  summis  significabatur.”  Suetonius  repeats  what  may  be  called  an 
idle  insinuation,  that  Nero  put  Britannicus  to  death  from  jealousy  of  his  skill  in 
singing.  Her.  33. 

3 Sir  G.  Cornewall  Lewis  remarks  on  the  failure  of  the  first  attempt  to 
poison  Claudius,  as  a proof  that  the  art  was  not  so  well  understood  at  this  time 
at  Rome  as  in  certain  periods  of  modem  history.  Early  Roman  History , ii. 


A.  U.  808.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


75 


menaced  the  poisoner,  as  traitors  to  his  cause,  and  interested 
only  in  averting  suspicion  from  themselves.  They  promised 
to  serve  him  faithfully  the  next  time ; the  poison  was  now 
prepared  in  the  palace  itself  under  the  emperor’s  own  eyes, 
and  he  was  assured  that  it  would  cause  death  as  swiftly  as 
steel  itself.1  Confident  of  the  result,  he  contrived  his  crime 
with  an  audacity  perhaps  unparalleled.  Britan-  B.ritanniCUS  is 
nicus  was  seated,  as  still  a minor,  at  the  table  Poisoned- 
where  the  younger  scions  of  the  imperial  family  partook  of 
their  simpler  meal  together,  while  their  elders  banqueted  in 
full  state  beside  them.  There  the  warm  wine-cup  was  tasted 
in  due  course,  and  presented  to  him.  He  found  it  too  hot, 
and  in  the  drop  of  cold  water  which  was  infused  into  it  so 
deadly  a poison  was  conveyed,  that  the  child,  on  swallowing 
it,  fell  back  lifeless  without  a word  or  a groan.  All  the 
guests  beheld  it.  Some  rushed  in  terror  from  the  apartment ; 
others,  warier,  and  more  collected,  still  kept  their  seats,  and 
bent  their  eyes  on  Nero.  He,  without  rising  from  his  couch, 
assured  them  placidly  that  such  were  the  fits  to  which  his 
brother  was  subject,  and  that  his  senses  would  soon  return. 
The  body  was  removed : the  guests  addressed  themselves,  as 
they  were  bidden,  again  to  the  banquet ; but  the  alarm  and 
horror  of  Agrippina,  remembering  perhaps  the  scene  which 
had  occurred  four  months  earlier  in  that  festive  hall,  were 
so  marked,  that  it  was  clear  to  all  that  she  at  least  was  guilt- 
less of  this  crime ; while  the  wretched  Octavia,  with  the  self 
control  which  long  necessity  had  taught  her,  suppressed  all 
signs  of  emotion,  and  betrayed  neither  grief  nor  affection  nor 

485.  note.  Here  is  a second  instance  of  inexperience.  We  must  be  the  more 
cautious,  therefore,  how  we  trust  to  the  many  rumours  of  poisoning  accredited 
by  the  Roman  writers. 

1 Suetonius  adds  various  particulars  to  the  account  of  Tacitus.  Nero,  he 
says,  called  Locusta  to  him,  abused  and  struck  her,  declaring  that  she  had  given 
an  antidote  instead  of  poison.  When  she  excused  herself,  affirming  that  she 
had  made  the  dose  weak  the  better  to  disguise  the  crime : As  if he  exclaimed, 
I feared  the  Julian  law  (against  murderers  and  poisoners) ! He  then  caused  her 
to  prepare  the  potion  in  his  own  apartments,  and  tried  it  on  various  animals,  till 
he  found  it  strong  enough  to  kill  a young  pig  instantaneously. 


76 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  55. 


fear.  That  same  night  the  corpse  of  Britannicns  was  con- 
sumed ; his  simple  pyre  had  been  prepared,  it  seems,  before- 
hand. The  obsequies  took  place  in  the  Campus  Martius,  in 
the  midst  of  a sudden  tempest,  betokening  to  the  citizens  the 
divine  indignation  at  a deed  of  blood  which  men  had  gener- 
ally agreed  to  excuse  as  a state  necessity.1 2  The  accounts 
which  Dion  followed  added  a further  horror  to  the  scene,  de- 
claring that  the  rain  washed  off  the  paint  with  which  the 
body  had  been  coloured,  and  disclosed  the  livid  stains  of 
poison.  In  a winter’s  night,  amidst  the  smoke  of  half-extin- 
guished torches,  such  an  incident  could  hardly  have  been 
observable.3 * 

From  first  to  last  every  circumstance  connected  with  this 
hideous  fratricide  was  carried  out  with  the  same  coolness  and 
calculating  prevision.  No  long-experienced  adept  in  crimes 
of  state  could  have  acted  with  more  consummate  art  than  the 
timid  stripling  before  us,  who  blushed  at  being  discovered  in 
the  embrace  of  a freedwoman.  No  sooner  were  the  hasty 
obsequies  completed,  than  an  edict  followed  in  which  their 
haste  was  excused  and  defended  by  argument  and  example. 
Nero  adroitly  seized  this  occasion  to  recommend  himself  to 
the  citizens  whose  sensibility  he  had  outraged.  Having  lost, 
he  said,  the  support  of  a dear  brother,  he  must  now  look  for 
aid  and  sympathy  to  the  republic  itself.  He  claimed  a deep- 
er interest  in  the  affections  of  his  people  since  he  had  be- 
come the  last  of  the  imperial  stock,  the  sole  remaining  hope 
of  a nation  to  whom  the  blood  of  Caesar  was  dear.  The 
emperor  completed  his  crime  by  showering  presents,  houses, 
and  estates  on  the  favourites  of  the  palace:  among  them 
were  some,  at  least,  whose  professions  of  superior  gravity 
made  their  participation  in  these  spoils,  for  as  such  they  were 
regarded,  peculiarly  invidious.8  The  hand  of  a master  of 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  18. ; Suet.  JVer.  33.  Suetonius,  however,  says  that  the 
funeral  followed  the  next  day. 

2 Dion,  lxi.  7.  This  assassination  probably  took  place  immediately  after 

the  birthday  of  Britannicus,  the  12th,  as  before  observed,  of  February. 

8 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  18.  In  this  remark  the  interpreters  have  generally  sup- 


A.  U.  808.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


11 


state-craft  can  hardly  be  mistaken  throughout  Grounds  for 
these  proceedings ; and  there  is  one  only,  as  far  as  crime^theid- 
we  can  judge,  to  whom  it  can  be  reasonably  as-  vice  of  Seneca* 
cribed.  Posterity,  while  it  shrinks  from  condemning,  must  not 
venture  to  acquit  him.1  At  all  events,  we  have  seen  that,  much 
later  than  this,  the  clemency  of  Nero’s  first  year  was  cele- 
brated by  Seneca  as  the  special  glory  of  his  own  instructions. 
It  is  clear  that,  at  least,  after  the  deed  was  done  he  consent- 
ed to  absolve  the  perpetrator,  and  to  persuade  the  world,  as 
far  as  his  silence  could  avail  to  persuade  it,  either  that  no 
murder  had  been  committed,  or  that  no  defence  was  required 
for  it. 

The  temptations  under  which  the  philosopher  lay  to  this 
duplicity  are  sufficiently  obvious.  His  influence  could  only 
be  maintained  by  parrying  the  counter  projects  of 

...  , Importance  of 

Agrippina ; and  his  influence  once  lost,  there  could  making  Nero’s 
be  no  more  hope  for  N ero  or  for  Rome,  for  himself  Seneca  aims  at 

, . i i . . . „ , , making  him 

no  retreat  but  m absolute  insignificance,  could  popular  with 
even  that  avail  to  save  him.  Undoubtedly  his 
position  was  a trying  one.  He  believed  that  his  power  at 
court  enabled  him  to  direct  the  empire  for  the  general  wel- 
fare. The  common  weal  was,  after  all,  the  grand  object  of 
the  heroes  of  Roman  story.  Few  of  the  renowned  of  old 
had  attained  their  eminence  as  public  benefactors,  without 
steeling  their  hearts  against  the  purest  instincts  of  nature. 
The  deeds  of  a Brutus  or  a Manlius,  of  a Sulla  or  a Caesar, 
would  have  been  branded  as  crimes  in  private  citizens ; it 
was  the  public  character  of  the  actors  that  stamped  them 
with  immortal  glory  in  the  eyes  of  their  countrymen.  Even 
Seneca,  sage  as  he  was,  was  not  superior  to  the  sophistry 

posed  that  he  points  at  Seneca.  Suetonius  (1.  c.)  says  that  Locusta  was  re- 
warded with  large  estates,  and  provided  with  pupils  to  be  instructed  in  the 
state  mystery  of  poisoning. 

1 We  need  pay  no  attention,  I think,  to  the  charges  of  Dion  against  Seneca 
(lxi.  10.),  which  seem  animated  with  more  than  his  usual  malignity  against  men 
of  reputation  for  virtue,  and  miss,  besides,  the  peculiar  weaknesses  which  are 
justly  imputable  to  the  philosopher. 


78 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  55. 


which  might  have  justified  the  murder  of  Britannicus  by  the 
precedent  of  Romulus  and  Remus.  Meanwhile  he  was  stu- 
dious in  directing  the  public  administration  of  his  pupil  to 
the  general  advantage  of  the  empire,  to  the  credit  and  ad- 
vantage more  particularly  of  the  senatorial  order,  which  was 
perhaps  the  best  direction  the  government  could  at  that  mo- 
ment take.1  While  it  was  the  best  for  the  people,  it  was,  at 
the  same  time,  the  most  prudent  for  the  prince.  A contented 
senate  made  a secure  emperor.  Claudius  well  understood 
this,  and  the  favour  he  showed  to  this  proud  and  privileged 
body  was  the  secret  of  his  immunity  from  senatorial  conspir- 
acies, and  enabled  him  to  quit  the  city  for  the  provinces 
without  apprehension,  which  Tiberius  had  never  ventured  to 
do.  This  policy  was  the  most  conducive  also  to  the  prince’s 
reputation.  The  fame  of  Nero’s  five  years  rests  mainly  on 
the  favour  it  obtained  from  a courted  and  therefore  an  indul- 
gent senate.  The  fathers  balanced  against  the  crime  of  fra- 
tricide the  fact  that  their  chief  had  rejected  statues  of  gold 
and  silver ; that  he  had  refused  to  allow  the  year  to  com- 
mence with  his  own  natal  month  of  December,  and  retained 
the  ancient  solemnity  of  the  Kalends  of  January;  that  he 
had  checked  with  a gentle  remonstrance  the  impetuous  zeal 
which  offered  to  swear  to  all  his  acts  beforehand ; that  he 
had  dismissed  with  contempt  the  charges  of  a delator  against 
a knight  and  a senator.2 

The  schism  between  the  mother  and  the  son  seemed  now 
complete.  Agrippina  embraced  the  wretched  orphan  Octa- 

1 We  may  ascribe,  perhaps,  to  the  liberal  views  of  the  minister  the  geo- 
graphical inquiries  instituted  by  Nero  in  the  direction  of  the  Caspian  Sea  and 
the  country  of  the  Ethiopians  (Plin.  H.  N.  vi.  15.  35.),  which  were  vulgarly 
supposed  to  be  preparatory  to  some  military  enterprises.  Comp.  Senec.  Nat. 
Qucest.  vi.  8.  The  long  digression  of  Lucan  ( Phars . x.)  on  the  subject  of  the 
river  Nile  seems  to  indicate  the  interest  of  the  best-informed  men  of  the  empire, 
and  particularly,  perhaps,  of  his  uncle  Seneca,  in  these  expeditions  of  discovery. 
The  yearning  for  extended  physical  knowledge  is  one  of  the  most  curious 
features  of  Lucan’s  poem. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  10.  Comp.  Suet.  Ner.  10.  “Agenti  Senatui  gratias  re- 
sponds : quum  meruero.” 


A.  U.  808. J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


*79 


via,  and  declared  herself  the  protectress  of  her 

7 . ■“  . . Division  be- 

injured  innocence.  She  called  her  friends  into  tween  Nero  and 

consultation  in  private : she  collected  money 
from  all  quarters  with  an  avidity  which  indicated  some  polit- 
ical project.  She  cultivated  the  regard  of  military  officers, 
and  caressed  the  remnant  of  the  ancient  nobility,  as  if  seek- 
ing to  make  a party  and  secure  a chief  for  it.  All  this  was 
disclosed  to  Nero,  who  retaliated  first  by  with-  „ . . 

. 7 ^ Her  enemies  m- 

drawmg  the  guard  by  which  the  empress  was  at-  trigue  against 
tended,  and  then  removing  her  from  her  apart- 
ments in  the  palace  to  the  mansion  formerly  inhabited  by 
Antonia,  that  the  attendants  at  his  own  receptions  might 
have  no  pretext  for  presenting  themselves  to  her  likewise. 
When  he  paid  her  a formal  visit  here,  he  was  always  escort- 
ed by  a military  guard,  and  restricted  the  interview  to  a brief 
salutation.  This  marked  disfavour  had  a strong  effect  on  the 
courtiers.  The  door  of  Agrippina  became  rapidly  deserted. 
Of  her  ancient  friends  none  but  a few  women  continued  to 
visit  her.  Among  these  was  Junia  Silana,  the  spouse  of  C. 
Silius,  whom  Messalina  had  required  him  to  divorce,  and  who 
now,  in  constant  hatred  of  the  dead  empress,  still  clung  to 
the  side  of  her  rival  and  successor.  Yet  she  had  a feud  with 
Agrippina  also  ; for  when  she  had  proposed  to  solace  herself 
with  another  marriage,  it  was  Agrippina  who  had  set  the 
object  of  her  choice  against  her;  and  her  present  attachment 
was  only  simulated^ with  a view  to  vengeance.  As  soon  as 
she  was  assured  that  the  mother  had  lost  all  influence  with  her 
son,  she  seized  the  moment  to  strike.  She  suborned  two  con- 
federates to  denounce  Agrippina  as  conspiring  against  the 
throne,  and  averred  that  it  was  her  scheme  to  raise  Rubellius 
Plautus,  the  son  of  Blandus,  who  stood  in  the  same  relation- 
ship to  Augustus  as  Nero  himself,  first  to  empire  and  then  to 
her  own  bed.1  There  was  another  woman  in  the  plot.  The 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  19.  Rubellius  Plautus  was  son  of  Rubellius  Blandus  (al- 
ready mentioned  in  chap,  xlvi.)  and  of  Julia,  daughter  of  Drusus,  granddaughter 
of  Tiberius.  He  was,  therefore,  through  his  grandmother,  great-great-grandson 
of  Augustus.  Nero  was  great-great-grandson  of  Augustus  through  his  grand- 
father Germanicus. 


80 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  55. 


pretended  conspiracy  was  divulged  to  a freedman  of  Domita, 
whose  hostility  to  Agrippina  was  well  known : Domitia 
passed  on  the  witnesses  to  Paris,  a favourite  of  Nero;  and 
late  one  night,  in  the  sacred  privacy  of  his  carousal,  the  em- 
peror was  startled  by  the  appearance  of  this  confidential 
servant,  with  an  assumed  look  of  deep  anxiety,  and  received 
intimation  of  the  unnatural  crime  which  was  said  to  be  med- 
itated against  him.  The  weak-spirited  youth,  whose  nerves 
were  already  shaken  with  premature  dissipation,  believed 
without  further  inquiry,  and  would  have  yielded  at  once  to 
the  suggestions  of  his  sudden  alarm.  He  would  have  com- 
manded not  only  the  immediate  execution  of  Plautus,  but 
the  removal  of  Burrhus  from  his  military  post,  on  the  mere 
suspicion  that,  having  been  originally  raised  by  Agrippina, 
he  would  be  disposed  now  to  support  her.  But  these  in- 
trigues of  the  palace  were,  it  is  confessed,  obscure  even  to 
the  citizens  at  the  time.  Some  writers  affirmed  that  Burrhus 
was  only  kept  in  his  place  by  the  interposition  of  Seneca ; 
while  others,  less  notorious  for  their  partiality  to  that  states- 
man, made  no  mention  of  any  doubt  on  Nero’s  part  of  the 
fidelity  of  Burrhus.1  Yet  all  combined,  without  hesitation, 
in  asserting  that  Nero  was  already  willing  and  even  anxious 
to  rid  himself  of  his  mother,  and  was  only  deterred  from  at 
once  commanding  her  death  by  the  assurance  of  Burrhus 
that  she  should  be  sentenced  judicially  if  the  crime  were 
proved  against  her.  Every  culprit,  it  was  honestly  insisted, 
might  claim  a hearing,  and  above  all  a parent.  As  yet  there 
were  no  accusers,  but  merely  a single  informer  against  her  ; 
and  he  the  emissary  of  a hostile  house.  Nero  acquiesced, 
heavy  perhaps  with  wine,  and  unaccustomed  to  argument. 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  20. : “ Fabius  Rusticus  auctor  est  . . . . spe  Senecae 
dignationem  Burrho  retentam.  Plinius  et  Cluvius,  nihil  dubitatum  de  fide  pne- 
fecti  referunt.  Sane  Fabius  inclinat  ad  laudes  Senecce .”  The  student  of  Tac- 
itus will  remark  the  numerous  instances  in  which  the  author  intimates  his  dis- 
like to  Seneca.  He  could  not  forgive  him  for  his  connection  with  the  monster 
Nero,  who  lived  to  be  detested  more  than  all  their  tyrants  by  the  senate  and 
aristocracy. 


A.  U.  808.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


81 


Agrippina  de- 
fends herself 
with  spirit. 


This  rapid  consultation  took  place  that  night : the  next 
morning  Agrippina  was  required  to  hear  the  charge  against 
her  and  refute  it.  Burrhus  conducted  the  ex- 
amination, and  Seneca  attended.  Burrhus,  anx- 
ious perhaps  for  himself,  was  violent  and  over- 
bearing. All  the  spirit  of  the  virago  flashed  out  at  once. 
She,  too,  spared  neither  sarcasm  nor  menaces.  It  was  well, 
she  said,  for  Silana,  the  childless,  to  suggest  that  she,  a moth- 
er, had  designs  against  the  life  of  a son ; as  if  mothers  could 
put  away  their  children  as  easily  as  strumpets  their  gallants. 
It  was  well  for  Domitia  to  vaunt  her  interest  in  Nero:  she 
who  was  adorning  her  fishponds  at  Baise,  while  Agrippina 
was  raising  him  to  the  family  of  the  Caesars,  to  the  procon- 
sular Potestas,  to  the  hope  and  promise  of  the  Consulship. 
And  then  she  demanded  an  interview  with  the  emperor  in 
person,  relying  on  the  power  of  a mother’s  indignation  or 
despair ; and  without  deigning  to  assert  her  innocence,  as  if 
distrusting,  nor  to  urge  her  claims,  as  if  reproaching  him,  she 
bluntly  required  the  punishment  of  her  accusers,  and  the 
reward  of  her  faithful  adherents. 

The  hardihood  of  Agrippina  was  crowned  with  more  suc- 
cess than  it  merited.  The  charges  against  her  were  declared 
to  be  unfounded,  and  of  those  whom  she  de-  The  charges 
nounced  as  the  inventors  of  the  calumny,  Calvi-  dedaredun-^0 
sius  and  Iturius  were  placed  in  distant  confine-  founded* 
ment,  the  freedman  Atimetus  was  put  to  death,  while  Silana 
herself  was  banished.  Paris  alone  escaped  free,  by  the 
special  grace  of  the  emperor,  who  admired  his  talents  as  an 
actor,  and  had  received  him  into  private  intimacy.  Rubel- 
lius  himself,  it  seems,  was  not  noticed  at  all.  The  favour 
which  Burrhus,  the  blunt  uncourtly  soldier,  still  retained,  is 
even  more  remarkable.  Not  only  were  the  insinuations  lev- 
elled on  this  occasion  against  him  disregarded,  but  when 
soon  afterwards  he  was  accused,  together  with  Pallas,  of  in- 
triguing for  a Cornelius  Sulla,  he  was  allowed  to  take  his 
place  among  the  judges,  and  turn  the  charge  against  himself 
into  a process  against  his  accuser.  Burrhus  again,  and  Pallas 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


82 


[A.D.  55. 


under  his  wing,  were  triumphantly  acquitted,  while  their  as- 
sailant Psetus  was  himself  condemned  to  banishment.1 

Such  were  the  firmness  and  moderation  of  Nero’s  admin- 
istration throughout  the  first  model  year  of  his  principate; 
and  for  some  years  afterwards  it  continued  to  be  conducted, 
Nero’s  dissolute  f°r  the  most  part,  on  similar  principles.  It  was 
amusements.  undoubtedly  the  administration,  not  of  the  young 
prince  himself,  but  of  the  shrewd  and  thoughtful  men  to 
whom  he  had  given  his  confidence ; and  Seneca  deserves  the 
praise  of  abstinence  from  bloodshed  and  violence,  and  a laud- 
able care  to  retain  his  patron  in  the  paths  of  ancient  usage. 
The  license  he  meanwhile  extended  to  his  private  amusements 
may  readily  be  pardoned.  If  it  was  impossible  to  engage 
the  light-minded  youth  in  the  details  of  business,  there  may 
have  been  no  better  course  than  to  absorb  him  in  frivolous 
pleasures,  which  should  leave  him  neither  leisure  nor  inclina- 
tion to  interfere  with  the  government  at  all.  Such  seems  to 
have  been  the  view  Seneca  took  of  the  alternative  before  him. 
But  in  after  years  the  frivolity  of  Nero,  and  the  vile  charac- 
ter of  his  pastimes,  seem  to  have  incensed  the  Romans  against 
him  no  less  than  the  tyranny  which  accompanied  them : the 
dislike  with  which  Seneca  is  regarded  by  Tacitus  was  caused 
perhaps  mainly  by  the  belief  that  it  was  he  who  corrupted 
the  principles  of  his  tender  charge,  and  undermined  in  him 
the  stern  simplicity  of  the  Roman  character.  The  careless- 
ness with  which  Nero  began  soon  to  exhibit  himself  in  the 
circus  and  the  theatre  will  appear  hereafter;  but  already  in 
the  second  year  of  his  reign  he  condescended  to  roam  the 
streets  disguised  as  a slave,  accompanied  by  his  boon  com-  * 
panions,  snatching  the  wares  exposed  for  sale,  cuffing  the 
angry  owners,  and  sometimes  receiving  blows  in  return.3 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  28.  Faustus  Cornelius  Sulla  was  husband  of  Antonia,  and 
son  in  law  of  Claudius,  cons.  a.  u.  805,  a.  d.  52.  Ann.  xii.  52. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  25.  We  know  not  what  exaggeration  there  may  be  in 
these  stories.  When  after  an  evening’s  debauch  Nero  appeared  next  morning 
without  any  marks  of  injury  on  his  visage,  it  was  whispered  that  he  had  applied 
a lotion  of  sovereign  efficacy  to  his  skin,  the  ingredients  of  which  were  indicated 
with  precision.  Plin.  H.  N.  xiii.  43. 


A.  U.  809.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


83 


These  freaks  soon  became  notorious,  and  many  dissolute 
youths  were  encouraged  by  the  example  to  perpetrate  like 
excesses.  But  when  Montanus,  a senator,  struck  A D 56 
the  emperor  unawares  in  one  of  these  nocturnal  u*  809> 
encounters,  and,  on  discovering  him,  too  openly  begged  his 
pardon,  he  received  an  order  to  kill  himself.  Thenceforth 
Nero  took  care  to  have  soldiers  always  at  hand  to  protect 
him.  This  taste  for  vulgar  brawls  induced  him  to  foster  the 
passions  of  the  stage,  until  the  licentiousness  of  the  specta- 
tors became  intolerable ; and  it  was  found  necessary  to  expel 
the  histrions,  or  pantomimic  dancers,  and  to  restore  the 
guard,  which,  from  the  time  of  Augustus  till  recently,  had 
kept  the  police  of  the  theatres.1 * * * * * * 

While  such,  however,  were  the  early  indications  of  a cor- 
rupt and  feeble  character  which  the  young  prince  exhibited, 
to  the  sorrow  of  decent  citizens  and  alarm  of  the 

. , . /■»  i • . . Consecration  of 

wiser  and  more  thoughtful,  various  incidents  in  a temple  to 
his  administration  recommended  it  strongly  to 
different  classes  of  his  people.  The  populace,  ever  favourably 
impressed  by  marks  of  family  affection,  were  pleased  at  the 
respect  he  had  seemed  to  show  to  the  memory  of  his  prede- 
cessor. Though  they  despised  Claudius  when  alive,  they 
acquiesced  in  the  ascription  of  divine  honours  to  him  after 
death,  and  thought  it  highly  becoming  in  his  successor  to 
build  him  a temple  after  the  manner  of  his  ancestors,  and  ap- 
point a college  of  Claudian  Flamens  from  among  the  highest 
families  of  the  city.8  Nor  did  Nero  disdain  to  recognise  the 
claims  of  his  natural  father,  while  paying  these  honours  to 

1 Tacitus  says:  “Non  aliud  remedium  repertum  est  quam  ut  histriones 
Italia  pellerentur,  milesque  theatro  rursum  insideret.”  The  soldiers  had  been 

just  before  -withdrawn.  The  histrions  or  mimes  are  to  be  distinguished  from 

other  performers.  It  was  only  the  former  that  were  expelled ; the  latter  were 
retained,  under  the  superintendence  of  a military  guard,  which  Augustus  had 

originally  assigned  for  that  purpose. 

8 Tac.  Ann.  xii.  ult.  The  temple  of  Claudius  on  the  Cgelian  hill  is  supposed 

to  have  stood  on  the  oblong  platform,  scarped  on  three  sides,  now  occupied  by 

the  garden  of  the  Passionists,  and  marked  from  a distance  by  a few  slender 

cypresses.  Ampere,  Hist.  Rom.  d Rome , § 3. 


84 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  56. 


the  adoptive.  He  obtained  a statue  for  Domitius  from  the 
senate.  For  Asconius  Labeo,  who  had  been  his  guardian 
after  his  father’s  death  and  still  survived,  he  demanded  the 
consular  ornaments.  This  attention  to  the  claims  of  others 
was  accompanied  by  modesty  in  regard  to  himself.  His  lib- 
erality was  eminently  conspicuous.  To  preserve  their  rank 
to  some  impoverished  senators,  he  endowed  them  with  the 
census  which  the  law  required.  At  the  same  time  he  follow- 
ed the  example  of  Augustus  and  Claudius  in  respecting  the 
prescriptions  of  the  state  religion.  When  the  temples  of 
Jupiter  and  Minerva, — two  of  the  cells  perhaps  of  the  triple 
temple  in  the  Capitol, — were  struck  with  lightning,  he  caused 
the  city  to  be  illustrated,  by  the  advice  of  the  Haruspices. 
Of  this  solemn  ceremonial  the  most  picturesque  feature  was 
a procession  of  the  priests  of  the  various  services;  the  Salii 
bearing  the  golden  shields  on  their  heads  ; the  Vestals  guard- 
ing the  sacred  Palladium ; the  Galli  who  lave  in  Almo  the 
Mother  of  the  Gods ; with  the  noble  Augurs  and  thrice-noble 
Flamens,  the  Septemvirs  and  Epulones,  and  every  lesser 
priesthood  girt  with  the  simple  cincture  of  the  rustic  Gabii.1 

We  do  not  hear,  indeed,  that  Nero  took  any  personal 
part  in  the  government ; and  whatever  merit  there  was  in 
Favourable  his  administration  must  in  fairness  be  ascribed 
of early  to  ministers  rather  than  to  their  master.  Nor 
government.  can  we  give  him  the  lesser  praise  of  deliberately 
choosing  his  instruments  well,  and  submitting  his  own  inex- 
perience to  their  riper  judgment.  Seneca  and  Burrhus  had 
been  given  him  by  Agrippina.  The  rare  occasions  on  which 
the  prince  appears  on  the  public  scene  during  this  period 
were  prepared  for  him  by  these  advisers,  and  the  kindly  acts 
or  sayings  imputed  to  him  were  doubtless  suggested  by  them. 

1 Lucan  gives  a spirited  description  of  the  procession,  which  no  doubt  he 
witnessed  himself  ( Phars . i.  592.) : 

“ Turn  jubet  et  totam  pavidis  a civibus  urbem 
Ambiri,  et  festo  purgantes  moenia  lustro 
Longa  per  extremos  pomoeria  cingere  fines 
Pontifices,  sacri  quibus  est  permissa  potestas,”  &c. 


A.  U.  809.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


85 


Thus  much  it  seems  just  to  detract  from  the  fame  of  Nero’s 
Quinquennium : nevertheless,  setting  aside  all  question  of 
the  real  authorship  of  the  acts  belonging  to  it,  the  general 
course  of  government  deserves  apparently  the  praise  it  has 
received.  The  kindness  of  kings  upon  their  coronation  day 
has  passed  into  a proverb.  Little  stress  need  be  laid  on  the 
gracious  promises  of  Nero  at  his  accession,  when  words  could 
cost  him  nothing,  and  might  gain  him  much.  His  declara- 
tions in  favour  of  justice  and  generosity  were  carried  out 
consistently  as  long  as  there  was  no  temptation  to  tyranny. 
The  senate  and  magistrates  were  suffered  to  exercise  their 
functions  without  control.  If  he  ever  interfered  within  their 
jurisdiction,  it  was  in  the  direction  of  mercy,  to  overrule 
harsh  sentences,  or  to  mitigate  them.1  Never,  however,  was 
there  a period  more  noted  for  the  punishment  of  great  crim- 
inals, especially  of  officers  convicted  of  extortion  in  the  prov- 
inces.2 But  all  these  cases  were  prosecuted  in  due  course  of 
law ; no  irregular  procedure  was  allowed  even  to  further  the 
ends  of  justice ; and,  above  all,  the  practice  of  delation  was 
rigidly  repressed.  This,  no  doubt,  was  the  circumstance 
which  invested  the  early  years  of  Nero  with  their  brightest 
colours.  There  were  no  trials  on  charges  of  Majestas ; and 
Nero  showed  himself,  even  to  a late  period,  superior  to  petty 
mortifications  from  raillery  and  libel. 3 4 The  empire  had  grown 
consciously  stronger  since  the  time  of  Tiberius,  and  could 
afford  to  disregard  ridicule.  Stories  were  current  of  the  un- 
wonted humanity  evinced  by  this  lord  of  the  world,  such  as 
was  seldom  shown  by  the  master  of  a score  of  bondmen. 
When  required  to  set  his  name  to  a sentence  of  death,  Would 
to  God,  he  exclaimed,  that  I had  never  learned  to  write!* 

1 See  the  cases  mentioned  by  Tacitus,  Ann.  xiii.  43.  52. ; and  again  xiii.  27., 
xiv.  18.  22.  45. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  30.  33.  42.,  xiv.  18.  26.  46. 

3 Suet.  Ner.  39. : “ Mirum  ....  nihil  eum  patientius  quam  maledicta 
et  convicia  hominum  tulisse.” 

4 Suet.  Ner.  10. : “ Quam  vellem  nescire  literas.”  The  story  is  from  Seneca, 
who  takes  occasion  to  remind  his  blushing  pupil  of  it  ( De  Clem.  ii.  1.) : “ Ut  de 


86 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  56. 


The  financial  measures  of  this  epoch  display,  as  far  as  we 
can  trace  them,  not  only  a liberality  which  might  be  con- 
founded with  mere  thoughtless  profusion,  but 

Liberality  of  . _ . & . \ 9 

Nero’s  financial  some  indications  of  a wise  and  intelligent  policy. 

]STero  inherited  from  Claudius  the  best  of  all  lega- 
cies to  a despot,  a full  treasury  and  a flourishing  revenue. 
He  could  give  without  borrowing  ; he  could  endow  without 
extorting.  A donative  to  the  soldiers,  the  necessary  condi- 
tion of  their  support,  was  followed  by  a largess  to  the  people, 
prudent,  no  doubt,  but  not  equally  indispensable.  Fresh 
drafts  of  veterans  were  established,  with  the  surrender  of 
public  domains,  in  the  colonies  of  Capua  and  Huceria.  An- 
other measure,  of  which  we  should  much  wish  to  know  the 
particulars,  was  the  advance,  apparently,  of  certain  sums  to 
the  treasury,  to  maintain,  as  the  historian  oracularly  phrases 
it,  the  solvency  of  the  Roman  people.  We  may  conjecture 
that  this  liberality  was  meant  to  relieve  the  farmers  of  the 
tolls  and  tributes,  or  other  responsible  agents  of  finance.  It 
amounted,  we  are  told,  only  to  forty  millions  of  sesterces ; 
and  it  is  hard  to  conceive  any  great  public  relief  being  effect- 
ed by  a loan  or  even  a gift  of  320,000  pounds  sterling.1  In 
their  excessive  jealousy  of  taxation  the  citizens  had  com- 
plained that  a rate  of  one  twenty-fifth  or  four  per  cent,  was 
exacted  by  the  state  on  the  purchase-money  of  slaves.  The 
buyer  of  these  articles  of  luxury  was  in  most  cases  the  Roman, 
the  vendor  was  the  subject  or  foreigner;  and  when  the  im- 
perial government  transferred  the  tax  from  the  buyer  to  the 
vendor,  the  multitude  were  led  to  suppose  that  they  had 
actually  escaped  it,  not  perceiving  that  the  amount  of  the 
rate  was  still  as  before  levied  upon  them  in  the  advanced 
price  of  the  commodity.9  Nor  was  it  the  ruling  caste  only 

dementia  scriberem,  Nero  Caesar,  una  me  vox  tua  maxime  compulit : quam  ego 
non  sine  admiratione  et  cum  diceretur  audisse  memini,  et  deinde  aliis  narrasse,” 
&c. 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  31.:  “Sestertium  quadringenties  aerario  illatum  est  ad 
retinendam  populi  fidem.” 

2 Tacitus  (1.  c.)  remarks  this  consequence : “ Specie  magis  quam  vi,  quia 
cum  venditor  pendere  juberetur,  in  partem  pretii  emptoribus  accrescebat.” 


A.  U.  811.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


87 


towards  which  this  consideration  was  extended.  When  the 
proconsuls  and  other  magistrates  abroad  were  forbidden  to 
exhibit  gladiators  and  wild  beasts  in  their  provinces,  the  re- 
striction must  have  been  meant  to  relieve  the  subjects  of  the 
state  from  the  burden  of  providing  them.1 

This  gleam  of  consideration  for  the  interests  of  a class  to 
whom  it  was  so  rarely  extended  by  the  Roman  statesmen, 
seems  to  indicate  a change  of  feeling  in  the  con-  His  proposal  to 
querors  towards  the  conquered,  which  we  are  SgS the  vec' 
prompt  to  remark,  expecting  important  conse-  ^d.  53. 

quences  to  follow.  But  we  are  still  doomed  to  a.tt.  an. 

be  disappointed.  Meagre  and  inconclusive  are  the  notices 
we  find  regarding  the  views  of  the  imperial  administration. 
It  is  impossible  to  construct  from  them  anything  which  may 
be  called  a policy.  We  note  the  glimmer  of  a great  social 
principle  beneath  the  folds  of  political  history ; but  in  a mo- 
ment the  field  of  vision  is  overclouded,  and  we  dare  not  in- 
dulge the  speculations  which  have  risen  in  our  minds,  lest  it 
should  appear  that  they  are  founded  on  a misapprehension 
of  our  own,  or  on  a misstatement  of  our  informant.  After 
the  financial  measures  just  mentioned,  Tacitus  proceeds  to 
speak  of  another,  apparently  of  much  greater  importance. 
The  circumstance  refers  to  the  fourth  year  of  Nero’s  reign, 
and  is  thus  stated  by  the  historian,  the  obscurity  or  confusion 
of  whose  account  it  may  be  well  to  exhibit,  to  show  by  a 
single  instance  how  little  precision  is  to  be  looked  for  in  the 
prince  of  pictorial  narrators.  So  numerous,  he  says,  were  the 
complaints  of  the  people  against  the  extortions  of  the  publi- 
cans, that  Nero  actually  meditated  surrendering  all  duties , 
and  conferring  the  noblest  of  all  presents  on  the  human  race. 
But  the  senators,  with  much  praise  of  his  liberality,  restrain- 
ed his  ardour,  by  proving  that  the  empire  would  be  dissolved 
if  the  imposts  by  which  it  was  supported  should  be  diminish- 
ed : for  it  was  clear  that  if  the  duties  were  abolished,  a remis- 
sion of  taxes  would  be  speedily  demanded.  They  showed 

1 Tac.  1 c. : “Ne  quis  magistrates  aut  procurator  qui  provinciam  obtineret, 
Bpectaculum  gladiatorum  aut  ferarum,  aut  quod  aliud  ludierum  ederet.” 


88 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  5&. 


that  many  associations  for  farming  the  revenues  had  been 
established  by  consuls  and  tribunes  of  the  plebs  at  a period 
when  the  Roman  people  were  most  jealous  of  their  liberties: 
. . . . they  allowed,  however,  that  it  was  expedient  to 

put  some  restrictions  on  the  cupidity  of  the  publicans.1  The 
question  here  arises  whether  the  duties,  of  which  Nero  would 
have  made  a present  to  the  human  race , were  those  which 
prevailed  generally  throughout  the  empire,  or  whether  they 
refer  only  to  such  as  were  peculiar  to  the  ruling  caste  of  citi- 
zens. Undoubtedly  the  offer,  at  first  sight,  seems  to  be  uni- 
versal ; and  so  it  has  been  generally  regarded  by  the  critics, 
historians,  and  writers  on  Roman  finance.  Yet  there  are 
words  in  the  passage  which  seem  to  me  very  clearly  to  limit 
its  application  to  the  Roman  citizens  only,  the  class  for  whom, 
according  to  ideas  which  had  not  yet  lost  their  force,  the 
subject  races  of  the  empire  toiled,  unpitied  and  unregarded. 

The  question  must  be  discussed  at  greater  length.  The 
abolition  of  the  whole  system  of  indirect  taxation  throughout 
the  empire  would  indeed  have  been  the  concep- 

Examination  of.  . _ T .......  , 

what  it  really  tion  oi  a madman,  it  could  only  have  been 
imports.  effected  in  company  with  an  immense  increase 
of  direct  payments,  such  as  the  land-tax,  poll-tax,  and  prop- 
erty-tax, at  a time  when  the  state  has  relinquished  all  claim 
to  the  absolute  use  and  possession  of  its  conquered  territories. 
But  no  such  increase,  it  would  seem,  was  contemplated. 
Nor,  again,  is  the  establishment  of  such  a system  of  free-trade, 
by  the  removal  of  all  imposts  on  commercial  transactions  be- 
tween land  and  land,  consistent  with  the  spirit  of  the  time, 
and  the  cherished  ideas  of  antiquity,  which  were  far  as  yet 
from  realizing  an  equality  of  rights  among  mankind.  Doubt- 
less Seneca  was  in  advance  of  his  age ; doubtless  he  w^ould 
speak  even  more  freely  as  a philosopher  than  he  would  act  as 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  50. : “ Crebris  populi  flagitationibus  immodestiam  publi- 
canorum  arguentis,  dubitavit  Nero  an  cuncta  vectigalia  omitti  juberet,  idque  pul- 
cherrimum  donum  generi  mortaliurn  daret  ....  Plerasque  vectigalium  socie- 
tates  a Consulibus  et  Tribunis  plebis  constitutas,  acri  etiam  populi  Romani 
turn  libertate.” 


A.U.  811.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


89 


a statesman ; yet  the  rare  expressions  of  political  liberality 
which  have  been  gleaned  from  his  writings  would  be  a very 
insufficient  ground  for  ascribing  to  him  any  profound  views 
on  this  subject.  Virtue,  he  says  in  one  place,  embraces  all 
men  together,  freedmen , slaves  and  Icings . . . . We  are 
born  to  a common  inheritance . . . . Wisdom  invites  the 
human  race  to  live  together  in  amity / Such  common  places 
as  these  constitute  at  best  but  a slender  claim  to  the  praise 
of  practical  liberalism.  It  seems  therefore  impossible  to  sup- 
pose that  Nero  really  meant  to  remit  the  whole  custom 
duties  of  the  empire.  I would  limit  the  extent  of  his  scheme 
to  a surrender  of  duties  payable  on  commodities  and  transac- 
tions in  Italy,  and  the  colonies  of  Roman  citizens.  Such  a 
remission  would  have  had  a clear  analogy  to  defend  it. 
From  the  time  of  the  conquest  of  Macedonia  the  land-tax  had 
been  remitted  to  the  citizens,  though  the  census  or  property- 
tax  on  moveables,  which  also  bore  the  invidious  name  of 
tribute,  continued  to  press  upon  them.  But  the  popular  tri- 
bune Metellus  Nepos  had  abolished  the  indirect  taxation  of 
tolls  and  dues  in  Italy,  and  it  was  with  great  soreness  that 
the  citizen  had  seen  this  burden  reimposed  by  J ulius  Caesar, 
and  maintained,  as  a state  necessity,  by  the  triumvirs  and 
the  emperors.  We  may  easily  believe  that  the  young  im- 
pulsive Nero  conceived  it  worthy  of  the  successor  of  the  tri- 
bunes, to  abolish  once  more  this  detested  impost  upon  the 
favoured  caste ; and  this  was  probably  as  far  as  his  liberality 
extended.  The  flourish  about  a boon  to  the  human  race  was 
an  indiscreet  bravado  either  of  the  ignorant  prince,  or  of  the 

1 Senec.  De  Benef.  iii.  18.:  “Virtus  omnes  admittit,  libertinos,  servos, 
reges.”  Epist.  95. : “ Membra  sumus  magni  corporis  ....  natura  nos 
cognatos  edidit.”  Epist.  90.:  “ Sapientia  genus  humanum  ad  concordiam 
vocat.”  These  and  a few  more  passages,  in  which  God  is  called  our  common 
parent , slaves  and  freemen  are  said  to  be  naturally  equal , &c.,  constitute,  I 
think,  the  writer’s  whole  claim  to  the  character  of  a cosmopolite.  They  are 
once  only  faintly  echoed  by  Lucan,  Phars.  i.  60. : 

“ Turn  genus  humanum  positis  sibi  consulat  armis, 

Inque  vicem  gens  omnis  amet.” 


90 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


unreflecting  historian.  Nero’s  advisers,  indeed,  naturally- 
pointed  out  that  the  burdens  of  which  the  citizens  complained 
had  been  originally-  imposed,  not  by  triumvirs  and  emperors, 
but  by  the  consuls  and  tribunes  of  the  free  state.  Rome  in 
the  height  of  her  pride  and  independence  had  felt  no  humil- 
iation in  submitting  to  them.  But  were  her  claim  to  ex- 
emption from  these  dues  conceded,  she  would  have  a pretence 
for  demanding  abolition  of  the  tribute  or  census  also,  and  for 
obtaining  that  complete  immunity  which  was  the  dearest 
wish  of  her  indolent  selfishness.1  Nero,  whose  generosity 
was  a mere  impulse,  founded  on  no  principle  of  policy  or 
humanity,  was  no  doubt  easily  persuaded  to  desist  from  his 
scheme ; and  perhaps  we  may  trace  in  the  genuine  liberality 
of  his  advisers,  who  discouraged  such  an  indulgence  to  a 
special  class,  the  wider  and  wiser  views  of  the  sage  who  pre- 
sided over  them.  The  project  resulted  in  a few  sensible  reg- 
ulations of  detail ; for  making  the  revenue  laws  better  known 
that  they  might  be  better  obeyed ; for  limiting  the  claims  for 
arrears ; for  putting  the  publicani  under  stricter  supervision ; 
for  abolishing  a few  trivial  but  vexatious  imposts ; for  reliev- 
ing the  importer  of  grain  from  the  pressure  of  certain  bur- 
dens ; and  -with  this  view  exempting  the  ships  of  the  corn 
merchants  from  the  common  tax  on  property.2 

The  salutary  regulations  here  recorded  belong  to  the  first 
three  or  four  years  of  this  principate ; but  the  general  im- 
The  policy  of  provement  of  the  administration  depended  on 
Satisfaction  to  principles  which  continued  to  operate  through 
the  senate.  the  first  at  ieast?  aud  in  many  cases  to  the 

end  of  a reign  of  more  than  thirteen  years.  So  long  did 

1 It  will  be  seen  that  I regard  the  phrase  of  Tacitus,  “donum  generi 
humano,”  as  an  incorrect  expression.  We  are  not  yet  in  a position  to  consider 
whether  the  times  in  which  the  historian  himself  wrote  offered  any  excuse  for 
this  mistake.  At  a later  period  the  exemption  of  Italy  from  the  land-tax  was 
annulled,  and  the  whole  empire  placed  on  an  equal  footing  in  respect  of  fiscal 
burdens.  Savigny  thinks  that  this  took  place  in  the  time  of  Diocletian  (see 
Vermischte  Schrift.  i.  43.),  from  an  obscure  passage  in  Aurelius  Victor  ( Ccesar 
30.),  on  the  occasion  of  the  permanent  establishment  of  an  imperial  court  and 
army  in  Italy.  2 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  51. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


91 


Nero  persist,  under  the  guidance  of  trusty  counsellors,  in 
maintaining  the  dignity  of  the  senatorial  order,  as  the  highest 
judicial  and  legislative  tribunal.  The  position  of  Seneca  and 
Burrhus  in  antagonism  to  Agrippina  could  only  be  main- 
tained by  upholding  the  authority  of  the  senate ; the  activity 
of  which  is  attested  by  the  number  of  laws  and  decrees  which 
at  this  period  emanated  from  it.  The  youth  and  inexpe- 
rience of  Nero,  overwhelmed  as  he  was  by  the  weight  of 
affairs  which  the  recent  example  of  his  laborious  predecessor 
forbade  him  to  reject,  compelled  him  to  rely  on  these  prac- 
tised advisers ; and  the  more  so  as  the  odium  which  attached  „ 
to  the  whole  class  of  the  imperial  freedmen  required  him  to 
waive  their  sUecour.  The  dispersion  of  the  secret  conclave 
gave  immediate  relief  to  the  senate,  which  breathed  more 
freely,  and  acted  more  boldly,  when  it  felt  that  no  private 
influence  stood  between  it  and  the  throne.  It  expressed  the 
sense  of  its  recovered  liberty,  partly  by  the  loudest  eulogies 
of  the  new  reign,  partly  by  renewed  activity  within  the 
now  extended  sphere  of  its  operations.1  On  the  occasion  of 
a military  success  in  Armenia,  it  not  only  saluted  Nero  as 
Imperator,  and  decreed  the  customary  supplications,  arches, 
and  statues ; but  established  an  annual  commemoration  of  the 
days  on  which  the  victory  was  gained,  the  news  brought 
home,  and  the  decree  made  concerning  it.  Were  we  to  thank 
the  Gods , said  C.  Cassius,  according  to  their  kindness , the 
whole  year  would  not  suffice  us.  Let  it  be  at  once  divided 
into  two  portions,  one  for  public  affairs , the  other  for  giving 
thanks  for  Nero.  Even  the  irony  of  a senator  who  bore  the 

1 Hoeck  has  collected  from  the  Digest  the  names  of  certain  Senatusconsulta ; 
viz.  Silanianum,  Calvisianum,  Memmianum,  Trebellianum,  and  Neronianum, 
which  may  be  referred  to  this  period.  They  apply  to  the  treatment  of  slaves 
to  adoption,  to  testamentary  trusts,  &c.  See  Roem.  Gesch.  i.  3.  p.  356.  fol. 
Nero  transferred  to  the  senate  a share  of  the  appeals  in  civil  cases,  which  recent 
princes  (and  perhaps  Claudius  more  particularly,  in  his  insatiable  appetite  for 
business)  had  grasped  for  themselves.  At  a later  period  he  relinquished  the 
labour  and  responsibility  altogether.  Such,  at  least,  seems  the  best  way  of 
reconciling  the  discrepancy  between  Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  28.  and  Suet.  Ner.  17.  See 
note  of  Baumgarten  Crusius  in  loc.  Suet. 


92 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


name  of  a tyrannicide,  if  irony  it  were,  proved  the  freedom 
of  speech  now  permitted  to  his  order.1 

The  ancient  usage  of  the  republic  still  required  the  prince 
to  take  his  seat  on  the  tribunal ; and  there,  assisted  by  his 
No  inquiry  council,  Nero,  like  Claudius  before  him,  listened 
Sregukritkfof  to  appeals  from  the  ordinary  courts  of  justice, 
Ms  private  life.  an(j  gave  £nai  sentence  from  his  own  breast. 
Warned,  however,  by  his-  predecessor’s  example,  he  limited 
the  addresses  of  the  rival  pleaders,  and  checked  vague  decla- 
mation by  requiring  each  point  to  be  separately  discussed  be- 
fore opening  on  another.2  His  judgments  were  issued  al- 
ways in  writing,  and  after  mature  deliberation ; and  in  the 
interval  he  expected  his  assessors  to  give  him  their  opinions 
separately,  from  which  he  made  up  his  own  in  private,'  and 
delivered  it  as  the  common  decision  of  the  cabinet.  It  would 
seem,  from  this  account  of  his  public  conduct,  that  he  was 
strongly  impressed  with  the  conviction  that  he  held  power 
on  sufferance  only ; and  was  not  blinded  by  adulation  to  the 
precariousness  of  his  position  as  the  first  citizen  of  an  aristo- 
cratic republic.  But  as  long  as  he  executed  his  delegated 
functions  for  the  common  weal  of  his  order,  they,  on  their 
part,  made  no  inquisition  into  the  privacy  of  his  domestic 
life.  The  curtains  which  the  Roman  drew  across  the  vesti- 
bule of  his  mansion  were  a sacred  screen,  behind  which  none 
could  enter  unbidden.  Within  that  veil  the  courteous  states- 
man or  the  bland  philosopher  might  play  the  tryant  to  his 
slaves,  to  his  children,  and  to  his  women.  There  self-indul- 
gence and  debauchery  in  their  grossest  shapes  sheltered 
themselves  alike  from  the  decrees  of  the  censors,  and  the 
murmurs  of  public  opinion.  It  was  not  till  a later  period, 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  41. 

2 Suet.  Ner.  15.  Baumgarten  Crusius  explains  him  thus : “ Er  liess  die 
Sache  Punkt  fur  Punkt  untersuchen “propuctis  testibus,  literis,  aliisque 
judicii  instruments,  idque  per  vices,  utraque  parte  alternatim  audita.  Hie 
igitur  transitus  fuit  ad  nostrorum  judiciorum  (the  German)  morem  ab  antique^ 
qui  observatur  in  Britannia  adhuc  terrisque  Galliae  subjectis.”  This,  no  doubt, 
is  the  improvement  to  which  Seneca  points  in  his  sneer  at  the  impatience  of 
Claudius : “ Una  tantum  parte  audita,  saepe  et  neutra.” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


93 


when  the  fall  of  Nero  dissipated  all  lingering  reserve,  that 
the  inner  life  of  the  palace  was  disclosed  to  the  eyes  of  the 
citizens,  and  the  process  laid  hare,  step  by  step,  by  which  he 
was  corrupted  into  a monster  of  depravity.  Already,  beneath 
the  show  of  care  for  the  interests  of  the  state,  he  was  learn- 
ing to  regard  his  own  safety,  his  own  convenience,  as  para- 
mount to  every  obligation,  and  trying  what  amount  of  hor- 
rors the  world  would  bear  for  the  sake  of  his  gracious  admin- 
istration. 

But  Rome  was  tranquil;  the  citizens  were  content;  the 
senate,  affecting  to  speak  the  voice  of  the  nation,  pronounced 
Nero  the  best  of  its  princes  since  Augustus. 

1 , , The  “ Quin- 

Afiairs  might  seem  to  run  more  smoothly  even  quennium  Ne- 
irom  the  absence  ol  great  principles  to  guide 
them.  Nero  differed  from  all  his  predecessors  in  the  extent 
to  which  he  suffered  affairs  to  take  their  natural  course. 
Julius  Caesar  had  deliberately  overthrown  old  forms  and  pre- 
scriptions which  he  felt  to  be  obsolete,  confident  of  the  crea- 
tive force  of  his  own  master-genius.  Augustus  strove  to  re- 
vive the  past.  Tiberius  was  content  with  shaping  the  pres- 
ent. Caius,  awakened  in  his  youthful  inexperience  to  the 
real  character  of  the  station  which  his  predecessors  had  dis- 
guised from  themselves  and  the  world,  chose  rashly  to  claim 
for  it  all  the  prerogatives  which  logically  belonged  to  it. 
Claudius  affected,  in  the  narrow  spirit  of  a pedant  on  the 
throne,  to  govern  mankind  by  personal  vigilance,  as  a master 
governs  his  household.  Nero,  at  last,  or  his  advisers  for  him, 
seems  to  have  renounced  all  general  views,  to  have  abstained 
from  interfering  with  the  machinery  of  empire,  and  contented 
himself  with  protecting  it  from  disturbance.  The  tradition 
of  the  felicity  of  these  five  auspicious  years,  to  which  the 
best  of  this  prince’s  successors  gave  long  afterwards  the  palm 
of  virtuous  administration,  attests  the  consciousness  of  the 
Romans  that  they  were  ruled  with  a masterly  inactivity.1 

1 It  was  the  well-known  saying  of  the  Emperor  Trajan,  fifty  years  later ; 
“ Procul  differre  cunctos  principes  Neronis  quinquennio.”  Aurel.  Victor,  Ccesar . 
5.,  j Epit.  5. 


94 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


Great  honour  is  undoubtedly  due  to  the  men  who  actually 
governed  for  Nero,  that  they  did  so  little  to  abuse  their  tem- 
porary ascendancy.  There  seems,  however,  less  reason  to 
extend  our  admiration  to  Nero  himself,  or  to  regard  this 
happy  result  as  the  triumph  of  philosophy  over  youthful  pas- 
sions, and  the  fatal  sense  of  irresponsibility.  We  must  rather 
admit  that  his  reserve  was  caused  by  incapacity  or  indiffer- 
ence, by  an  engrossing  taste  for  frivolities  which  belonged  to 
his  tender  years,  or  by  the  dissipation  to  which  his  position 
too  naturally  enticed  him. 


A.  U.  811.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


95 


CHAPTER  LIII. 

KERO’S  PASSION  FOR  POPPA5A  SABINA. — INTRIGUES  AGAINST  AGRIPPINA. — NERO’S 
MACHINATIONS  AGAINST  HER  UNSUCCESSFUL. — SHE  IS  FINALLY  DESPATCHED  BY 
HIS  ORDERS. — SENECA  AND  BURRHUS  IMPLICATED  IN  THE  MURDER. — INSTITUTION 
OF  THE  NERONIAN  GAMES. — THE.  LUDI  MAXIMI. — NERO’S  INSENSIBILITY  TO  NA- 
TIONAL FEELING. — MODERATION  IN  REGARD  TO  CHARGES  OF  LIBEL  AND  MAJESTY. 
— DEATH  OF  BURRHUS. — SENECA  SEEKS  TO  WITHDRAW  FROM  PUBLIC  LIFE. — RISE 
AND  INFLUENCE  OF  TIGELLINUS. — DEATH  OF  PLAUTUS  AND  SULLA. — NERO’S  EX- 
TRAVAGANCE AND  CRUELTY. — REPUDIATION,  BANISHMENT,  AND  DEATH  OF  OCTAVLi. 
— PROSECUTION  OF  WEALTHY  FREEDMEN,  DORYPHORUS  AND  PALLAS. — NERO’S 
PROGRESS  IN  LICENTIOUSNESS. — HE  EXHIBITS  HIMSELF  IN  THE  CIRCUS. — HIS  IN- 
FAMOUS DEBAUCHERY. — BURNING  OF  ROME. — PERSECUTION  OF  THE  CHRISTIANS. — 
RESTORATION  OF  THE  CITY. — NERO’S  GOLDEN  HOUSE. — FURTHER  EXACTIONS  AND 

CONFISCATIONS. CONSPIRACY  OF  PISO. — ITS  DETECTION  AND  PUNISHMENT. — 

DEATH  OF  LUCAN  AND  SENECA. — PRETENDED  DISCOVERY  OF  THE  TREASURES  OF 
DIDO. — DEATH  OF  POPP.EA. — FURTHER  PROSCRIPTIONS. — STORMS  AND  PESTILENCE. 
— REFLECTIONS  OF  TACITUS. — DEATH  OF  ANNAEUS  MELA. — PROSECUTION  AND 
DEATH  OF  SORANUS  AND  THRASEA. — A.D.  58-66.  A.U.  811-819. 

THE  legislation  of  Nero’s  principate  lias  been  examined, 
and  the  character  of  his  civil  administration  depicted, 
from  the  notices  of  historians  and  jurists.  The  TJncertaint  of 
materials  are  slender,  and  the  delineation  is  neces-  the  history  of 
sarily  unsteady  and  superficial.  Such  is  the  pub-  thls  penod' 
lie  history  of  the  times.  But  we  now  turn  to  an  intrigue  of 
the  palace,  a story  of  domestic  hate  and  private  crime,  and 
we  find  its  whole  course,  and  every  detail,  described  to  us 
with  the  clearest  and  strongest  lines;  while  to  the  careful 
inquirer  more  darkness  really  hovers  over  this  picture  than 
the  other.  A thoughtful  reader  can  hardly  peruse  a sentence 
of  the  Annals  of  Tacitus,  his  chief  guide  at  this  period,  with- 
out feeling  that  he  is  in  unsafe  hands.  The  matters  of  which 


96 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  58. 


his  author  now  treats  had  for  the  most  part  no  public  hear- 
ing ; transacted  in  secret,  they  could  only  have  been  revealed 
by  treacherous,  or  at  least  by  interested  narrators ; and  it  is 
with  vexation,  not  unmixed  with  wonder,  that  we  remark  the 
complacency  with  which  he  recounts  events  of  which  he  could 
have  had  no  certain  knowledge,  of  which  false  and  coloured 
statements  must  necessarily  have  been  rife,  and  can  hardly 
have  failed  to  imbue  the  representations  of  the  writers  from 
whom  he  almost  indiscriminately  drew.  Many  persons,  says 
the  Jewish  historian  Josephus,  have  undertaken  to  write  the 
history  of  Nero  / of  whom  some  have  disregarded  the  truth 
on  account  of  favours  received  from  him , others  from  per - 
sonal  hostility  have  indulged  in  abominable  falsehoods.  As 
a foreigner,  Josephus  was  exempt  from  many  of  the  preju- 
dices of  the  Romans ; he  regarded  these  matters  from  a more 
distant  and  a clearer  point  of  view.  Undoubtedly,  the  par- 
ticular details  of  intrigue  and  crime,  on  which  we  are  about 
to  enter,  must  be  received  with  caution  and  distrust ; never- 
theless, Josephus  himself  believes  in  the  poisoning  of  Britan- 
nicus,  and  the  murders,  now  to  be  related,  of  Agrippina  and 
Octavia;  the  name  of  Nero  is  branded  with  atrocities  which 
can  neither  be  denied  nor  extenuated.1  The  story  must  be 
told  as  it  is  delivered  to  us,  and  no  man  will  care  to  mar  its 
horrible  interest  by  scrutinizing  step  by  step  the  ground  on 
which  he  is  treading. 

Since  her  defeat  by  Seneca  and  Burrhus,  at  the  outset  of 
the  new  reign,  the  empress-mother  seems  to  have  refrained 
Rise  of  Poppaea  from  provoking  a further  trial  of  strength;  and, 
Sabina.  ' possibly,  she  regained  by  this  prudent  reserve  a 
portion  of  the  influence  she  had  forfeited.  When,  after  an 
interval  of  almost  five  years,  the  curtain  again  draws  up  on  a 
scene  of  the  interior  of  the  palace,  we  find  Nero  still  married 
but  not  united,  to  Octavia,  Agrippina  watching  their  con- 
nexion with  a jealousy  which  frustrates  every  attempt  to 
draw  him  into  another  marriage,  while  Acte  still  retains  her 


1 Joseph.  Antiq.  Jud . xx.  V 3. 


A.  U.  811.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


97 


place  as  the  reigning  favourite.  We  find  the  young  and 
gallant  Otho  still  first  of  the  prince’s  friends  and  associates, 
fascinating  his  master  by  his  graces,  and  rising  in  public 
honours.  Nero  is  now  two  and  twenty  instead  of  seventeen : 
in  other  respects  we  note  little  change  in  the  personages  or 
situations  of  the  drama.  But  a new  character  now  steps 
upon  the  stage,  destined  to  work  out  a startling  catastrophe. 
Poppsea  Sabina,  the  wife  of  Otho,  was  the  fairest  woman  of 
her  time,  and  with  the  charms  of  beauty  she  combined  the 
address  of  an  accomplished  intriguer.1  Among  the  dissolute 
women  of  imperial  Rome,  she  stands  preeminent.  Originally 
united  to  Rufius  Crispinus,  she  had  allowed  herself  to  be  se- 
duced by  Otho,  and  obtained  a divorce  in  order  to  marry 
him.  Introduced  by  this  new  connexion  to  the  intimacy  of 
Nero,  she  soon  aimed  at  a higher  elevation.  But  her  husband 
was  jealous  and  vigilant,  and  she  herself  knew  how  to  allure 
the  young  emperor  by  alternate  advances  and  retreats,  till, 
in  the  violence  of  his  passion,  he  put  his  friend  out  of  the 
way,  by  dismissing  him  to  the  government  of  Lusitania.3 
Poppaea  suffered  Otho  to  depart  without  a sigh.  She  profit- 
ed by  his  absence  to  make  herself  more  than  ever  indis- 
pensable to  her  paramour,  and  aimed,  with  little  disguise,  at 
releasing  herself  from  her  union  and  supplanting  Octavia,  by 
divorce  or  even  by  death.3 

It  seems,  however,  that  this  bold  design  could  only  be 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  45.  (under  the  year  811):  “ Huic  mulieri  cuncta  alia  fuere 
praeter  honestum  animum.”  There  are  several  busts  in  existence  supposed  to 
represent  Poppaea  ; but  their  authenticity  is  very  questionable.  The  features 
are  of  infantine  grace  and  delicacy,  not  unsuited  to  the  soft  voluptuousness  of 
the  habits  imputed  to  her.  See  Ampere,  Hist,  de  Rome  d Rome , § 8.  But  her 
images,  we  are  told,  were  generally  destroyed  at  the  death  of  Nero. 

2 The  story  is  somewhat  differently  told  by  our  authorities,  and  even  by 
Tacitus  himself  in  his  Histories  and  his  Annals.  In  the  latter  work  he  speaks, 
no  doubt,  from  his  latest  and  best  information,  which  agrees  with  the  distich 
in  Suetonius  ( Otho,  3.) : 

“ Cur  Otho  mentito  sit,  quaeritis,  exul  honore  ? 

Uxoris  mcechus  coeperat  esse  suae.” 

3 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  46.,  a.  d.  58,  a.u.  811. 

VOL.  vi. — Y 


98 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  59. 


effected  by  the  overthrow  of  Agrippina.  If  this  woman  had 
Detestation  in  recovered  a portion  of  her  power  over  her  son, 
she  at  least  retained  little  of  his  affections.  To 
lariy  held.  control  him  by  fear  was  no  longer  possible ; an 
influence  once  broken  could  never  be  restored  on  the  footing 
of  ancient  habit.  There  was  hardly  a crime  of  which  she 
was  not  reputed  guilty ; there  was  no  excess  of  which  R.ome 
believed  her  incapable.  Murder  and  adultery  were  the  com- 
mon instruments  of  her  ambition : in  marrying  Claudius  she 
had  engaged  in  an  act  which  popular  feeling  regarded  as  in- 
cest. Indignant  and  disgusted  at  her  crimes,  her  debauch- 
eries, and  the  crimes  and  debaucheries  of  her  favourites  and 
creatures,  hating  her  as  the  sister  of  Caius,  hating  her  as  the 
wife  of  Claudius,  loathing  her  as  the  harlot  of  Narcissus  and 
Pallas,  execrating  her  at  last,  in  the  bitterness  of  their  disap- 
pointment, as  the  vile  daughter  of  their  noble  Germanicus, 
her  countrymen  were  prepared  to  believe  the  rumour  that 
she  had  tried,  as  a last  device,  to  entangle  her  own  son  in  a 
criminal  intrigue  with  herself.1  Some,  indeed,  whispered  that 
Nero  had  been  the  first  to  solicit  his  mother;  but  the  other 
story  gained  more  general  credence ; no  one  asked  whether 
a woman  of  fifty  could  dream  of  such  a conquest  over  the 
fairest  charmers  of  the  court,  or  betray  her  odious  secret  to 
those  who  watched  around  her.  But  so  nearly  was  she  suc- 
cessful, they  went  on  to  aver,  that  it  was  with  difficulty  her 
arts  were  frustrated  by  Seneca;  who  deterred  Nero  from  the 
crime,  by  representing,  from  the  lips  of  Acte,  the  shock  it 
would  cause  to  public  feeling,  and  the  dangers  which  might 
ensue.3 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  2.  (a.  u.  812):  “Tradit  Cluvius  Agrippinam,”  &c.  On 

the  other  hand : “ Fabius  Rusticus  non  Agrippinae  sed  Neroni  cupitum  id  me- 
morat.  . . . Sed  quae  Cluvius  eadem  caeteri  quoque  auctores  prodidere,  et 

fama  hue  inclinat.” 

2 The  strange  story  told  by  Dion  (lxi.  11.)  seems  equivalent  to  a confession 
that  this  scandal  was  not  generally  reputed  worthy  of  belief : aXX’  ekeivo  fib , 
eit’  akrjdEQ  ejeveto , eIte  irpoq  tov  rpbnov  avT&v  ettXcicOt],  ovk  dida  • a 6e  by 
irpdc  it&vtov  ufioTidyyrai  Xeyw,  on  iraipav  Tiva  ry  ’ Aypimrivij  ofioiav  6 "Nipuv 
cY  abro  tovto  eq  ra  fialiora  yyaxyos,  Kal  av-y  re  eks'ivjj  npooTratfav,  ical  role 


A.  U.  812.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


99 


However  this  may  be,  and  whether  or  not  Agrippina,  the 
writer  of  a scandalous  chronicle  herself,  has  suffered  from  the 
lying  tongues  of  enemies  of  her  own,  Poppsea  was  _ 
now  engaged  with  her  m open  strife,  and  one  or  trigues  against 

° ° x 7 her. 

the  other  must  perish  in  the  contest.  Poppsea 
had  so  far  succeeded  as  to  get  her  lover  to  contemplate  mar- 
riage with  her,  while  he  still  shrank  from  the  preliminary 
steps.  Of  Octavia,  indeed,  neither  one  nor  the  other  took 
account.  It  was  Agrippina’s  anger,  Agrippina’s  power,  that 
Poppaea  sought  to  overcome.  She  treated  Nero  as  a child 
controlled  by  an  unreasonable  parent;  she  excited  him  to 
rebel  against  undue  authority;  made  him  ashamed  of  his 
subservience,  and  alarmed  at  the  state  of  dependence  in 
which  she  represented  him  as  lying.  He  was  no  emperor, 
she  said;  he  was  not  even  a free  man.  Finally,  she  per- 
suaded him  that  his  mother  was  conspiring  against  him : the 
charges  triumphantly  rebutted  four  years  before,  were  re- 
peated with  more  success:  for  Nero  began  now  to  feel  an 
interest  in  believing  them,  and  he  had  learnt,  in  the  exercise 
of  his  power,  that  it  was  possible  to  condemn  the  suspected 
without  bringing  them  face  to  face  with  their  accusers.1 

No  intrigue  of  the  palace  could  be  supposed  complete  at 
this  period,  unless  Seneca  was  its  instigator  or  accomplice ; 
and  accordingly  the  sage  is  himself  accused  of  uerocontem- 
counselling  the  dreadful  crime  which  has  now  to  Jj*  mur‘ 
be  related.  The  first  attempt  on  Agrippina’s  life,  mother- 

kvdetKvvfievoq , eAeye  on  nal  rij  firjrpl  dfiiXotij.  Lucan,  towards  the  end 
of  his  poem,  speaks  with  true  Roman  indignation  of  the  incest  permitted  to 
the  Parthians,  in  which  he  may  possibly  hare  had  regard  to  stories  nearer 
home  (viii.  406.) : 

“ Damnat  apud  gentes  sceleris  non  sponte  peracti 
(Edipodionias  infelix  fabula  Thebas  : 

Parthorum  dominus  quoties  sic  sanguine  mix  to 
Nascitur  Arsacides ! cui  fas  implere  parentem 
Quid  rear  esse  nefas  ! ” 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  1.  Such  was  the  dread  in  which  Nero  at  this  time  held 
his  mother,  that  he  entertained  thoughts  (so  at  least  we  are  assured)  of  quit- 
ting Rome,  divesting  himself  of  power,  and  returning  to  a private  station  at 
Rhodes.  Suet  Ker.  84. 


100 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


f A.  D.  59. 


as  recounted  by  Tacitus,  is  one  of  the  darkest  scenes  of  Ms 
long  tragedy.  That  it  is  true  in  the  main,  we  have  at  least 
no  reason  to  question ; but  Suetonius  and  Dion  have  each 
added  details,  not  wholly  consistent  with  one  another,  wMch 
may  serve  to  remind  us  that  the  particulars  of  such  deeds 
could  seldom  be  accurately  known,  and  how  much  scope 
there  was  for  invention  and  embellishment  in  the  obscurity 
of  contemporary  history.  Nero,  it  seems,  full  of  fear  or  dis- 
gust, long  avoided  all  private  intercourse  with  his  mother,  and 
recommended  her  to  withdraw  to  a suburban  residence.  But 
this  was  not  enough  to  reassure  Mm.  There  was  no  inten- 
tion of  bringing  her  to  trial : open  violence  against  her  could 
not  be  ventured : against  poison  she  was  guarded  by  her  own 
caution,  and  the  fidelity  of  her  attendants:  the  statement 
that  she  had  fortified  herself  by  antidotes,  is  one  of  the  vul- 
gar fictions  of  antiquity,  which  modern  science  scarce  deigns 
to  refute,  yet  it  is  not  impossible  that  she  allowed  such  a 
rumour  to  be  spread  as  a measure  of  precaution.  Again, 
after  the  mysterious  death  of  Britannicus,  a second  catastro- 
phe of  the  kind  in  the  imperial  family  would  have  excited 
terrible  suspicions.  Among  the  prince’s  intimates  was  one 
Anicetus,  a freedman  of  the  court,  but  advanced  to  the  com- 
mand of  the  fleet  at  Misenum,  who  had  formerly  been  his 
preceptor,  and  had  personal  grounds  of  hostility  to  Agrip- 
pina. This  man  explained  to  his  eager  patron  the  mechanism 
by  which  a vessel  might  be  constructed,  to  fall  in  pieces  at  a 
given  signal  in  the  water.  In  this  Agrippina  should  be  in- 
vited to  embark ; the  disruption  of  the  treacherous  planks 
might  be  imputed  to  the  winds  and  waves,  and  then  her  pious 
son  might  erect  a temple  to  his  victim,  and  satisfy  the  un- 
conscious world  of  his  dutiful  affection.1 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  3.  Suetonius  says  that  the  first  design  was  to  crush 
Agrippina  under  the  falling  roof  of  a chamber  prepared  on  shore  for  the  pur- 
pose ; but  that  of  this  Agrippina  was  forewarned.  Ner.  34.  Dion  assures  us 
that  Poppaea  and  Seneca,  not  Nero,  first  took  the  idea  of  the  treacherous  ship 
from  some  machinery  of  the  kind  in  the  theatre,  and  applied  it  to  the  pro- 
jected destruction  of  Agrippina.  But  this  strange  mechanism  occurs  again  in 


A.  U.  812.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


101 


Such  a vessel  was  accordingly  prepared,  fitted  up  sump- 
tuously, and  assigned  for  the  conveyance  of  Agrippina  from 
Bauli,  where  she  would  land  from  Antium,  to 

. i . . _ Failure  of  an 

Baise,  whither  she  was  invited  by  Aero,  at  the  attempt  to  de- 
celebration  of  the  five  days’  festival  of  Minerva 
in  the  month  of  March.  At  this  period,  the  beginning  of 
spring,  the  fashionable  season  of  the  baths  began;  and  Nero 
pretended  to  open  it  with  an  act  of  reconciliation  with  the 
parent  from  whom  he  had  been  too  long  estranged.  The 
empress  left  her  own  vessel  at  Bauli,  as  anticipated,  and  was 
received  on  the  beach  by  Nero;  but  apprised,  as  was  be- 
lieved, of  some  intended  treachery,  she  declined  to  mount 
the  fatal  bark,  and  insisted  on  completing  the  transit  to  Baiae 
in  a litter.  But  there  every  apprehension  was  removed  by 
the  caresses  lavished  upon  her.  The  banquet  was  protracted 
to  a late  hour,  and  when  at  last  Nero  took  leave  of  her  with 
the  blandest  demonstrations  of  affection,  she  no  longer  hesi- 
tated to  enter  the  vessel  which  had  been  sent  to  Baiae  to  re- 
ceive her.  The  weather  was  fair,  the  sky  brilliant  with  stars, 
the  gay  company  of  the  baths,  turning  night  into  day,  linger- 
ed on  the  beach  as  she  embarked.  There  was  nothing  strange 
or  unusual  in  such  a nocturnal  excursion.  But  no  sooner  had 
the  rowers  put  off  from  shore  than  the  canopy  beneath  which 
Agrippina  reclined  with  her  ladies  gave  way  under  the  weight 
of  lead  with  which  it  had  been  loaded,  and  crushed  one  of 
her  attendants.  At  the  same  instant  the  bolts  were  suddenly 
withdrawn.  In  the  confusion,  however,  the  mechanism  fail- 
ed to  act;  the  sailors  tried,  by  rushing  to  one  side  of  the 
vessel,  to  overturn  or  sink  it,  having  means  at  hand  to  make 
their  own  escape.  This  too  was  unsuccessful,  but  Agrippina 
and  her  companions  were  immersed  in  the  water,  and  one  of 
the  women,  named  Acerronia,  hoping  to  save  herself  by  ex- 
claiming that  she  was  the  empress,  was  beaten  with  oars  and 
drowned.  Agrippina,  with  more  presence  of  mind,  kept 
silence,  and  swam,  or  floated  on  fragments  of  the  wreck,  till 

Dion’s  history  (lxxvi.  1.),  under  the  reign  of  Severus.  Reimer  refers  to  a coin 
of  that  emperor  on  which  it  is  represented.  See  Yaillant,  Num.  Imp.  ii.  230. 


102 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  59. 


picked  up  by  boats  from  the  shore ; but  she  too  was  struck 
once  on  the  shoulder.  Carried  to  a villa  of  her  own  on  the 
banks  of  the  Lucrine  lake,  and  now  fully  conscious  of  the 
treachery  from  which  she  had  so  narrowly  escaped,  she  felt 
in  her  retreat  that  the  only  chance  of  safety  was  to  pretend 
entire  ignorance  of  it.  Without  delay  she  despatched  her 
freedman  Agerinus  to  Nero,  to  announce  her  happy  escape 
from  a lamentable  accident,  to  entreat  him  to  calm  his  own 
impatience,  and  defer  visiting  her  till  she  had  tended  her 
wounds,  and  rested  from  her  fatigues. 

Of  the  failure  Nero  was  already  made  aware.  He  had 
watched  the  vessel  quit  the  shore  of  Baiae : perhaps  in  the 
„ moonlight  he  had  witnessed  the  catastrophe ; at 

nations  against  all  events,  long  before  the  arrival  of  Agerinus, 
he  was  apprised  that  Agrippina  had  escaped, 
wounded,  but  with  life ; and  he  knew  too  well  that  she  was 
no  longer  deceived  by  his  caresses.  He  believed,  in  his  ter- 
ror, that  she  was  prepared  to  arm  her  slaves,  to  call  upon  the 
soldiers,  to  appeal  to  the  senate  and  people  against  him. 
Burrhus  and  Seneca  were  at  hand.  Tacitus  leaves  it  uncer- 
tain whether,  as  some  believed,  they  were  actually  concerned 
in  the  plot.  His  silence  may  be  taken,  perhaps,  as  so  far 
„ favorable  to  them.  When,  however,  they  came 

Complicity  of  . . 

Seneca  and  mto  the  princes  presence,  and  heard  his  conies- 

sion  of  guilt  and  earnest  demand  tor  advice,  there 
was  first  a long  silence ; they  may  have  despaired  of  dissuad- 
ing ; possibly  they  thought  that  there  now  was  no  alterna- 
tive: either  the  son  or  the  mother  must  perish.  At  last 
Seneca  turned  to  Burrhus  and  asked  whether  the  soldiers 
should  be  directed  to  kill  her.  Burrhus  replied  that  the  sol- 
diers could  not  be  trusted  against  a daughter  of  Germanicus : 
Let  the  admiral , he  said,  be  required  to  fulfil  his  promise. 
. . . . Be  mine  the  deed , replied  Anicetus ; whereupon 

Nero  exclaimed  with  transport  that  this  was  the  first  day  of 
his  Imperium  ; that  he  owed  the  boon  to  a freedman.  When 
Agerinus  presently  appeared,  Anicetus  let  a dagger  be  drop- 
ped at  his  feet,  then  seized  him  as  an  assassin,  and  loaded 


A.  U.  812.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


103 


him  with  chains ; intending,  after  the  murder  of  Agrippina, 
to  declare  that  she  had  attempted  to  assassinate  the  emperor, 
and,  failing  in  her  design,  had  put  an  end  to  her  own  existence 
The  Baian  palace  and  the  Lucrine  villa  lay  perhaps  not 
many  furlongs  apart,  and  these  incidents,  crowded  within  a 
narrow  space,  had  all  occurred  in  the  course  of  a 

. . . . . , _ . Murder  of 

few  hours.  As  soon  as  Agrippina  s disaster  was  Agrippina  ef- 
known  to  the  residents  of  the  coast,  they  rushed 
to  the  beach,  thronged  the  moles  and  terraces  and  leapt  into 
the  boats  beneath  them,  to  ascertain  what  had  befallen  her. 
The  shore  gleamed  with  innumerable  torches,  and  resounded 
with  cries,  and  vows,  and  agitated  murmurs.  When  it  was 
known  that  she  had  escaped,  the  multitude  hurried  to  her 
place  of  refuge  in  a tumult  of  joy.  Arrived  at  the  doors,  they 
found  them  beset  by  the  armed  band  of  Anicetus.  Placing 
a guard  at  every  entrance,  the  freedman  had  made  his  way 
into  the  villa,  and  required  the  slaves  to  lead  him  into  their 
mistress’s  presence.  There  lay  the  matron  on  a couch,  with 
a single  attendant,  by  the  light  of  a single  lamp,  waiting 
anxiously  for  her  messenger’s  return.  Reassured  for  a mo- 
ment by  the  enthusiasm  of  the  populace,  she  sickened  over 
the  long  delay;  and  when  the  cries  of  the  multitude  sank 
into  silence,  too  surely  presaged  the  end  which  was  to  follow. 
The  slave  herself  slipped  at  last  out  of  the  room,  and  as  she 
exclaimed,  Do  you  too  desert  me  ? she  beheld  Anicetus  and 
his  soldiers  enter.  She  had  scarce  time  to  bid  them  return 
with  a favourable  account  of  her  health  to  their  master,  when 
one  of  them  struck  her  on  the  head  with  a stick,  and  the  rest 
rushed  upon  her,  and  despatched  her  with  many  wounds,  she 
exclaiming  only,  as  she  lay  prostrate  before  them,  Strike  the 
womb  which  bore  a monster  I1 

In  this  account,  says  Tacitus,  all  writers  in  the  main 
agree.  As  to  what  is  reported  to  have  followed  there  was 
no  such  general  agreement : we  may  believe  it  if  B ^ ^ 
we  will.  Perhaps  he  would  wish  us  to  believe,  haviourof 
what  he  dares  not  himself  assert,  that  Nero  came 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiy.  3-8. 


104 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  59. 


in  person  to  examine  the  corpse  of  the  mangled  old  woman, 
and  coolly  praised  its  beauty  to  his  attendants.1  The  remains 
were  burnt  the  same  night  without  ceremony ; nor  were  they 
even  entombed  till  some  of  Agrippina’s  domestics  placed  the 
ashes  in  a decent  sepulchre  beside  the  road  to  Misenum.  One 
of  her  freedmen,  Mnester,  slew  himself  upon  it ; a token  of 
fidelity  which  deserves  at  least  to  be  recorded  to  her  credit. 
Through  a long  career  of  ambition  and  wickedness  she  had 
never  blinded  herself  to  the  fate  which  too  surely  awaited 
such  a position  and  such  schemes  as  hers.  When  she  con- 
sulted the  Chaldeans  about  her  son’s  fortunes,  they  had 
warned  her  that  he  was  destined  to  reign  himself,  and  then 
to  slay  her.  Let  him  hill  me , she  had  answered,  let  him  but 
reign? 

Then  began,  if  we  may  believe  some  writers,  the  torments 
of  mind  which  from  thenceforth  never  ceased  to  gnaw  the 
Nero  attempts  heart-strings  of  the  matricide : the  Furies  shook 
seifto^he^en-  torches  in  his  face ; Agrippina’s  spectre  flit- 

ate-  ted  before  him ; the  trumpet,  heard  at  her  mid- 

night obsequies,  still  blared  with  ghostly  music  from  the  hill 
of  Misenum.3  However  they  might  falter  in  their  hopes  or 
fears  about  the  future,  the  ancient  moralists  clung  fondly  to 
the  conviction  that  successful  crime  meets  a sure  punishment 
in  this  world.4  We  shall  read  how,  many  years  later,  Nero 
shunned  the  sight  of  Athens,  as  the  city  of  the  vengeful 
Eumenides,  and  shrank,  in  conscious  guilt,  from  initiation  in 
the  Mysteries;  yet,  I fear,  too  much  reliance  must  not  be 
placed  on  these  popular  imaginations,  for  we  are  informed 

1 So  also  Dion,  lxi.  14. : ovk  ySeiv  bn  ovtcj  nakrjv  pyrepa  elxov. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  9. : “ Occidat  dum  imperet.” 

3 Suet.  Ner.  34. : “ Ssepe  confessus  exagitari  se  materna  specie,  verberibus- 
que  Furiarum  ac  taedis  ardentibus.”  Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  10. ; Dion,  1.  c. ; Stat. 
Sylv.  ii.  7.  118.: 

“ Pallidumque  visa 
Matris  lampade  respicis  Neronem.” 

4 Juvenal,  xiii.  2. : 

“ Prima  est  haec  ultio,  quod  se 
Judice,  nemo  nocens  absolvitur.” 


A.  U.  812. J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


105 


that  he  ventured  himself  to  enact  the  part  of  Orestes ; nor 
would  Lucan  have  alluded  to  the  fate  of  Clytaemnestra,  had 
the  murder  of  Agrippina  been  known  to  have  left  a sting  in 
his  patron’s  breast.1  We  are  assured,  however,  and  so  far  no 
doubt  truly,  that  the  first  impulse  of  the  self-accuser,  was  to 
fly  from  the  scenes  which  could  not  change  their  faces  like 
the  courtiers  to  flatter  him , and  retire  to  Naples,  from  whence 
he  despatched  a letter  to  the  senate,  composed,  as  usual,  by 
Seneca,  explaining  the  deed  he  had  perpetrated.  This  mis- 
sive asserted  that  his  mother  had  conspired  against  his  life ; 
that  her  creature  had  been  found  with  a weapon  in  the  audi- 
ence chamber ; that,  in  confusion  at  the  discovery,  she  had 
perished  by  her  own  hand.  I am  scarcely  yet  assured  of  my 
safety , exclaimed  the  monster:  It  is  no  satisfaction  to  me, 
he  added,  to  have  escaped?  The  disaster  in  the  bay  he  rep- 
resented as  an  accidental  shipwreck.  He  declared,  however, 
that  the  death  of  this  imperious  woman  might  be  accepted, 
at  all  events,  as  a public  benefit ; and  he  enumerated  her  acts 
of  arrogance  and  ambition,  ascribing  to  her  fatal  influence 
many  of  the  worst  excesses  of  Claudius.  The  explanation 
bordered  too  closely  on  a justification:  it  was  taken  as  a 
murderer’s  confession  of  guilt,  veiled  by  the  ingenuity  of  a 
hired  advocate.  But  to  put  the  best  face  on  their  master’s 
enormities  was  recognised  as  the  duty  both  of  the  minister 
and  the  courtiers.  While  the  senators  heaped  flatteries  and 
felicitations  upon  him,  they  contrived  to  sell  their  suffrages 
for  some  acts  of  favour.  Some  exiles  were  recalled,  particu- 
larly noble  women,  who  were  said  to  have  suffered  through 
the  influence  of  Agrippina ; the  ashes  of  Lollia  Paulina  were 

1 Lucan,  vii.  777. : 

“ Haud  alias,  nondum  Scythica  purgatus  in  ara, 

Eumenidum  vidit  vultus  Pelopeus  Orestes.” 

Comp.  Suet.  Her.  21. ; Dion,  lxiii.  22.  According  to  Feuerbach  (der  Vatican. 
Apollo),  the  Apollo  Belvedere,  which  may  have  stood  in  Nero’s  villa  at  An- 
tium,  is  not  the  Dragon-slayer,  but  the  Averter  of  the  Furies.  Undoubtedly 
the  posture  is  not  that  of  an  archer. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  11.  Quintilian  quotes  from  the  letter  these  words:  “Sal- 
vum  nec  esse  adhuc  nec  credo  nec  gaudeo.”  Inst.  Oral.  viii.  5.  18. 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


106 


[A.  D.  59. 


restored  to  her  native  country,  and  a tomb  permitted  to  be 
raised  over  them. 

Nevertheless,  the  crime  of  which  the  wretched  youth  was 
conscious,  seemed  so  far  to  transcend  the  worst  deeds  of  the 
Roman  princes,  that  Nero  still  apprehended,  when  reflection 
returned,  a burst  of  indignation  and  even  violence.  The  de- 
meanour of  his  facile  nobles  reassured  him  beyond  all  expec- 
tation. Still  he  hesitated  to  show  himself.  His 

His  triumphal  , . _ . 

entry  into  advisers  urged  him,  as  his  best  security,  to  aflect 
the  confidence  of  innocence.  Still  trembling,  still 
blushing,  he  entered  Rome  in  the  face  of  day.  Seneca,  Burr- 
hus, even  the  hardy  Anicetus,  might  be  amazed  at  his  glow- 
ing reception.  The  senators  came  forth  in  their  festal  robes 
to  meet  him : their  wives  and  children  were  arranged  in  long 
rows  on  either  side  of  the  way ; the  streets  were  thronged 
with  seats  raised  against  the  houses,  to  accommodate  the 
multitude  of  spectators  as  at  a triumphal  procession.  And  a 
triumph  indeed  it  was  : Nero  had  conquered  Rome,  and  now 
led  its  people  at  his  chariot-wheels  to  the  Capitol.  There  he 
offered  thanksgivings  to  the  Gods,  and  descended  again  only 
to  fling  himself,  in  insolent  security,  into  every  form  of  mon- 
strous dissipation,  from  which  the  last  remains  of  reverence 
for  a mother  had  hitherto  served  to  withhold  him.1 

So  secure,  indeed,  was  the  monster  of  his  subjects’  servile 
devotion,  that  he  could  now  venture  to  despise  the  grim 
raillery  with  which  the  populace  assailed  him;  for  it  was 
more  in  jest  than  indignation  that  they  hung  the  sack,  the 
instrument  of  death  for  parricide,  about  his  statues,  placard- 
ed the  walls  with  the  triad  of  matricides,  Nero , Orestes , 
Alemoeon , the  three  men  that  slew  their  mothers , and  teased 
him  by  pretending  to  denounce  the  perpetrators  of  these 
offensive  ribaldries.2  A discreet  neglect  soon  caused  this 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  13. 

2 Dion,  lxi.  16. : 

"Nepov  ’0 pi<JT7jc,  ’ ATiK/ia'iuv,  firjTpoKrdvoi. 

Comp.  Suet.  Ner.  3. : 

“ Quis  negat  J3neae  magna  de  stirpe  Neronem? 

Sustulit  hie  matrem,  sustulit  ille  patrem.” 


A.  U.  812.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


107 


petty  annoyance  to  cease.  The  current  of  men’s 

r . . ^ . . Nero  gratifies 

excited  imaginations  was  speedily  diverted  by  the  populace 

. , , . 1 J J ■with  shows. 

the  celebration  oi  magnificent  games,  and  the  re- 
flections of  the  jeering  populace  were  turned  from  their  ruler’s 
cruelty  to  the  indecency  with  which  he  descended  himself 
upon  the  stage,  and  contended  in  feats  of  skill  with  the 
singers  and  musicians.  Already  at  an  earlier  period,  in  his 
passion  for  charioteering,  he  had  erected  a circus  in  his  own 
gardens  on  the  Vatican,  and  there  he  had  held  the  whip  and 
reins  in  the  presence  of  applauding  spectators  admitted  by  invi- 
tation to  his  private  entertainments.  His  tutors,  it  was  said, 
had  conceded  him  this  indulgence  to  keep  him  from  the  more 
heinous  impropriety  of  singing  and  playing ; for  he  threatened 
to  come  forth  like  Apollo,  a Roman,  as  he  remarked,  no  less 
than  a Grecian  divinity,  and  claim  as  an  honour  for  himself 
the  admiration  which  was  allowed  to  be  honourable  to  the 
Deity.  But  he  would  be  now  no  longer  thus  restricted.  He 
resolved  to  exhibit  himself  as  an  actor;  and  still  shrinking 
from  the  reputed  enormity,  of  appearing  before  promiscuous 
multitudes  on  the  public  stage,  he  devised  a new  festival, 
which  he  called  the  Juvenalia,  to  be  held  within  Instjtution  of 
the  precincts  of  the  palace.  The  prince  himself  the  Juvenalia* 
was  the  hero  of  this  solemnity.  Arrived  at  the  age  of  man- 
hood, his  beard  was  clipped,  and  the  first  tender  down  of  his 
cheek  and  chin  enclosed  in  a golden  casket,  and  dedicated  to 
Jupiter  in  the  Capitol.1  This  ceremony  was  followed  by 
music  and  acting;  men  of  all  ranks  and  in  great  numbers 

1 Dion,  lxi.  19.  There  may  be  some  question  about  the  exact  period  of  the 
institution  of  the  Juvenalia.  Tacitus  mentions  it  under  the  year  812,  but  he 
does  not  expressly  state  that  it  was  then  instituted,  for  which,  however,  we 
have  Dion’s  authority.  The  ceremony  of  first  cropping  the  beard  was  more 
properly  performed  in  the  twentieth  year  (Suet.  Calig.  10.) ; and  if  Nero  was 
born,  as  I suppose,  in  October,  790,  this  would  bring  the  date  to  810  or  811. 
Suetonius  and  Dion  tell  a story,  which  I reject  without  hesitation  as  worthless, 
that  Nero  caused  his  aunt  Domitia  to  be  poisoned  with  a pretended  medicine, 
from  mere  caprice,  because,  being  sick,  she  had  said  she  could  now  die  without 
regret,  having  lived  to  see  her  darling’s  beard  clipped.  Hitherto  at  least  Nero’s 
enormities  were  not  without  a motive. 


108 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  59. 


were  admitted  as  spectators ; illustrious  Romans  were  bribed 
to  exhibit  themselves  as  dancers  and  singers ; grave  senators 
and  stately  matrons  capered  in  the  wanton  measures  of  mer- 
cenary buffoons  and  posture-makers.  The  degradation  to 
which  Nero  thus  constrained  his  noblest  subjects  seems,  in 
the  view  of  the  philosophic  Tacitus,  to  deepen  the  shades 
which  hung  over  the  fame  of  the  matricide.  The  historian 
proceeds  to  describe,  as  an  enhancement  of  his  excesses,  the 
establishment  of  what  we  should  call  a public  garden  round 
the  basin  of  Augustus  beyond  the  Tiber,  where  drinks  and 
viands  were  distributed  to  the  populace,  and  all  comers,  gen- 
tle and  simple,  received  a ticket  for  refreshments,  which  good 
men  exchanged  for  these  vile  commodities  because  they  were 
compelled,  the  profligate  from  depraved  inclination.  Hence- 
forth vice,  he  says,  walked  abroad  more  heinous  and  more 
shameless  than  ever.  These  promiscuous  assemblages  of  men 
and  women  of  all  ranks  together,  corrupted  the  manners  of 
the  age  more  than  any  cause  that  could  be  named.1 

Last  of  all,  to  crown  the  universal  degeneracy,  when  his 
people  had  been  sufficiently  corrupted,  Nero  descended  him- 
Nero  descends  self  upon  the  stage,  with  the  lyre  in  his  hand, 
upon  the  stage.  which  he  wag  geen  tune  with  nervous  solici- 
tude before  commencing  his  performance.  His  voice  was 
husky,  his  breath  was  short,  and  all  the  appliances  of  his  art 
were  unavailing  to  correct  their  defects.2 3  But  of  this  he  was 
much  too  vain  to  be  conscious.  Nevertheless,  to  silence  en- 
vious detractors,  a troop  of  soldiers  was  kept  always  in  at- 
tendance, and  at  their  head  stood  Burrhus  himself,  disguising 
the  sob  of  shame  with  ejaculations  of  applause.  A band  of 
young  nobles,  entitled  Augustani,  was  enrolled  to  applaud 
the  performance,  to  praise  the  divine  beauty  of  the  prince, 
and  the  divine  excellence  of  his  singing.8  Doubtless  the 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiy.  15. : “ Nec  ulla  moribus  corruptis  olim  plus  libidinum  cir- 
cumdedit  quam  ilia  colluvies.” 

2 Dion,  lxi.  20. : fia  (ipaxv  koX  pe^av.  Lucian,  Neron.  7. : To  6e  ttvev- 

pa  oTiiyov  nai  ovk  airoxp&v  tzov  8rj. 

3 Nero,  it  seems,  had  been  charmed  at  Naples  by  the  performance  of  pro* 


A.  U.  813.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


109 


verses  already  quoted  from  Seneca  were  frequently  in  their 
mouths.  Kero  himself  was  a verse  maker  also.  His  claims 
to  poetical  merit  were,  as  might  he  expected,  meagre,  and  he 
so  far  distrusted  himself  in  this  art  that  he  entertained  many 
rhymers  about  him,  whose  business  it  was  to  catch  each 
pretty  turn  of  phrase  or  thought  that  fell  from  him,  and 
weave  it  into  verse  as  best  they  might.  You  may  trace , 
says  Tacitus  gravely,  in  the  poems  of  Nero  the  manner  of 
their  origin  : for  they  flow  not , as  it  were , with  a current  and 
inspiration  of  their  own:  they  have  no  unity  of  style  or 
meaning r.1  In  private,  Nero,  as  a philosopher’s  pupil,  affected 
some  interest  in  philosophical  discussions,  the  common  pas- 
time of  educated  men  in  his  time ; and  he  suffered  himself  to 
be  attended,  after  the  fashion  of  the  day,  by  the  professed 
sages  of  Greece  and  Home.  It  is  said  however  that  he  had 
no  real  sympathy  with  their  pursuits ; he  enjoyed  a boyish 
gratification  in  setting  them  to  wrangle  together.  Agrip- 
pina, indeed,  is  accused  of  having  dissuaded  him  from  the 
study,  as  unfit  for  a king  of  men.2  For  painting  and  sculp- 
ture, as  Grecian  arts,  he  may  have  acquired  the  taste  of  a 
virtuoso,  and  the  charms  of  Grecian  architecture  incited  him 
to  magnificence  in  building.3  But  his  true  delight  was  in  the 
shows  of  the  theatre  and  the  circus.  In  813  he  institution  of 
institued  games  called  after  himself  Neronia,  to  the  Neronia' 
be  conducted  in  the  Greek  fashion,  and  to  recur  periodically 
like  the  Olympian.4  They  embraced  musical  and  gymnas- 

fessional  claqueurs  from  Alexandria,  and  made  them  his  model.  Suet. 
Ner.  20. 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  16. : “ Non  impetu  et  instinctu,  nec  uno  ore  fluens.”  Sue- 
tonius [Ner.  52.)  holds  that  he  did  compose  his  verses  himself,  and  appeals  to 
the  manuscripts  he  had  seen  of  them. 

2 Suet.  Ner.  52. 

3 The  statues  of  the  Apollo  Belvedere,  whether  it  be  an  original  work  of 
Grecian  art,  or  a Roman  copy  (it  seems  not  yet  to  be  decided  whether  the  ma- 
terial be  the  marble  of  Paros  or  of  Carrara),  and  the  Fighting  Gladiator,  were 
found  in  the  ruins  of  Nero’s  palace  at  Antium.  Of  Nero’s  taste  for  building  I 
shall  speak  hereafter.  On  the  subject  of  the  former  work,  see  above,  p.  125,  n. 

4 Dion,  lxi.  21. : Suet.  Ner. : “ Instituit  quinquennale  certamen  primus  om- 


110 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  60. 


tic  contests,  as  well  as  chariot-racing.  For  games  of 
athletic  skill  he  erected  a gymnasium,  this  designation,  as 
well  as  the  contests  themselves,  being  altogether  new  to  the 
Romans.  It  is  curious  to  read  in  Tacitus  how  the  old-fash- 
ioned citizens,  still  a numerous  and  respectable  body,  mur- 
mured at  the  introduction  of  these  foreign  customs,  which 
they  connected  with  the  reputed  profligacy  of  Grecian  morals, 
and  how  the  rising  generation  defended  them.1  No  page  of 
our  author  reads  more  like  a declamation  of  our  own  day. 
Nero  caused  himself  to  be  inscribed  on  the  list  of  Citharcedi, 
and  obtained  the  prize  as  the  best  of  lyrists  without  an  an- 
tagonist ; for  all  the  rest  were  declared  by  the  judges  un- 
worthy even  to  compete  with  him.  No  reward  was  given 
for  eloquence  ; but  Nero  again  was  pronounced  to  be  the 
conqueror.  The  first  public  display  of  Lucan’s  poetical  ge- 
nius was  made  on  this  occasion ; when  he  came  forward  to 
sing  the  praises  of  the  prince  who  had  made  him  his  compan- 
ion and  assistant.3  On  the  whole  the  first  celebration  of  the 
Neronia  was  dignified  and  imposing  ; for  the  low  buffoonery 
of  the  histrions,  the  favourites  of  the  baser  sort,  was  excluded 
from  this  Hellenic  festival.  It  was  remarked  that  from  this 
time  the  Greek  fashions,  long  denizened  in  Naples  and  the 
cities  of  Campania,  obtained  more  and  more  favour  with  the 
Roman  voluptuaries ; the  loose  Greek  robes  in  which  the 
spectators  were  enjoined  to  array  themselves,  to  favour  the 
illusion  of  the  spectacle,  were  retained  in  common  use,  and 
displaced,  in  spite  of  the  sneer  of  Augustus,  the  toga  of  the 
world’s  masters.8 

nium  Romas.”  According  to  Eckhel  ( Doctr . Numm.  vi.  264.)  these  games  con- 
tinued to  be  repeated  as  late  as  the  time  of  Constantine. 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  21,  22.  The  contempt  of  the  Romans  for  the  gymnic  en- 
tertainments of  Greece  is  marked  by  Lucan,  vii.  270. : 

“ Grails  delecta  juventus 
Gymnasiis  aderit,  studioque  ignava  palaestrae.” 

8 Suetonius,  vit.  Lucan. 

3 Tac.  1.  c.  The  chlamys,  a loose  and  short  cloak,  and  crepis,  a kind  of 
sandal,  were  distinctive  articles  of  Grecian  costume,  already  much  in  use 
among  the  Roman  sojourners  at  the  Greek  cities  of  Italy.  See  note  of  Lipsius 
on  Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  21. 


A.U.  813.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


Ill 


Our  authorities,  especially  Suetonius  and  Dion,  abound 
in  details  of  the  grandeur  and  extravagance  of  the  shows 
with  which  Nero  astonished  his  people,  more 

x x , Increasing  ex- 

particularly  on  the  occasion  of  celebrating  the  trayagance  of 

r J the  shows. 

Ludi  Maxirni,  as  he  styled  them,  for  the  etermty  The  Ludi  Max. 
of  the  Roman  Empire.  The  most  remarkable  of 
these  exhibitions  was  perhaps  that  of  an  elephant  which  de- 
scended from  the  cornice  of  the  amphitheatre  to  the  arena 
upon  the  tight  ropey — it  does  not  appear  how  it  first  reached 
that  elevation, — with  a Roman  knight  on  his  back.  The  dis- 
tribution of  precious  objects, — gold,  jewels,  tissues,  pictures, 
animals,  and  finally  ships,  houses,  and  estates, — exceeded  the 
wanton  liberality  of  Caius.  N ero  followed  the  Roman  tradi- 
tion in  constructing  an  amphitheatre  for  the  display  of  his 
own  elegant  spectacles ; 1 but  he  amazed  and  mortified  them 
by  excluding,  in  the  spirit  of  Greek  humanity,  the  combats 
of  gladiators,  and  by  refusing  to  sacrifice  the  life  even  of  con- 
demned criminals.  Yet  his  scruples  were  those  of  the  man 
of  art,  rather  than  the  man  of  feeling.  His  Roman  entertain- 
ments were  served  after  the  bloodier  fashion  of  his  own  coun- 
trymen. In  the  course  of  his  feign  he  is  said  to  have  pro- 
duced not  less  than  five  hundred  senators  and  six  hundred 
knights  arrayed  for  combat,  though  evidently  their  contests 
were  not  meant  to  be  mortal.  While  the  populace  exulted 
in  the  descent  of  their  magnates  into  the  arena,  Nero  himself 
was  better  pleased  when  he  prevailed  on  them  to  compete  on 
the  stage  in  music,  and  reduced  what  at  other  times  had  been 
an  occasioned  sally  of  vanity  to  a regular  practice.  Foreign 
spectators  were  more  affected  than  either  the  prince  or  his 
people,  at  beholding  beneath  their  feet  a Paulus,  a Mummius, 
a Scipio,  and  a Marcellus,  whose  fathers’  trophies  were  still 
conspicuous  in  the  streets,  whose  fathers’  halls  and  temples 

1 The  theatres  adapted  to  scenic  representations,  in  which  the  Greeks  were 
content  to  exhibit  such  spectacles,  were  incapable,  of  course,  of  receiving  the 
crowds  of  the  great  metropolis ; but  Nero,  like  many  great  builders  before 
him,  was  content  with  a temporary  edifice  of  wood. 


112 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  6a 


were  the  proudest  monuments  of  the  city.1  ^ero  was  the 
first  of  the  emperors  who  seems,  with  some  emotions  of  sensi- 
bility, to  have  been  wholly  devoid  of  national  prejudices. 
Coarse  and  unamiable  as  the  national  feeling  of  the  Romans 
was,  the  world  had  no  better  security  against  wanton  and 
unmitigated  tyranny. 

We  have  now  reached  a period  when  the  chief  of  the 
Roman  state,  the  representative  of  its  most  illustrious  fami- 
lies, is  found  altogether  insensible  to  the  princi- 

Nero’s  insensi-  , 

biiity  to  na-  pies  which  had  carried  her  m triumph  through 

tional  feeling.  r _ . _ _ . ..  r * 

every  combmation  oi  foreign  and  domestic  peril. 
The  announcement  of  such  a fact  may  induce  us  to  pause  in 
our  narrative,  and  estimate,  as  we  best  may,  the  circum- 
stances of  the  times  which  made  such  a phenomenon  possible. 
Was  the  gay  and  thoughtless,  but  instructed  and  accom- 
plished, prince  before  us  the  impersonation  of  the  general  feel- 
ing, or  an  exception  to  it  ? He  was  partly  both.  His  want 
of  sympathy  with  antiquity  is  to  be  ascribed  partly  to  his 
education,  which  was  exceptional,  partly  also  to  his  position, 
in  which  he  represented  the  lowest  class  of  citizens,  and  re- 
The  result  of  fleeted  their  temper  and  instincts.  The  teaching 
Kne princ£  °f  Seneca,  which  drew  all  its  interest  from  the 
stoicphiioso-  Greek  philosophy,  was  alien  from  the  old  Roman 
Phr-  sentiments.  His  doctrines  were  essentially  cos- 

mopolite. He  sought  to  refer  questions  of  honour  and  justice 
to  general  and  eternal  principles,  rather  than  solve  them  by 
the  test  of  precedents  and  political  traditions.  The  educated 
men  of  the  later  Republic,  as  well  as  of  the  early  Empire, 
had  opened  their  arms  wide  to  embrace  these  foreign  specu- 
lations ; and  whether  they  had  resigned  themselves  to  Epicur- 
ism, as  was  the  fashion  under  Julius  and  Augustus,  or  had 
cultivated  Stoicism,  which  was  now  more  generally  in  vogue, 

1 Suet.  Ner.  12. ; Dion,  lxi.  17. : Kat  edaKTvloSetKTOvv  ye  avrovg  aUrjluoig, 
Kai  eirD^yov,  M aKe6frveg  ph> , ovrdg  konv  6 tov  HavMnj  etc/owog  • 'E IJkijveg  de, 
oi'Tog  tov  Mopptov  • ’ZuieTuarai,  idere  tov  KAavdiov  • ’HTreipaxrcu,  Idere  tov 
wAtztzvov  . ’Aciavoi,  rov  Aovklov  • “Iffy pef,  tov  HovttIiov  • Kapxv^6vioiy 
A<ppiKav6v  • 'Poficuoi  tie  tz avrag. 


A.  U.  813.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


113 


they  equally  abandoned  the  ground  of  their  unpolished 
fathers,  which  asserted  the  pre-eminence  of  patriotism  above 
all  the  virtues,  the  subordination  of  every  claim  of  right  and 
duty  to  national  interest  and  honour.  But  men  cannot  rule 
the  world  in  the  same  spirit  in  which  they  conquer  it. 
Humanity  in  its  widest  sense,  as  sympathy  with  man,  follows, 
by  the  condition  of  our  nature,  on  the  sense  of  ease  and 
security.  We  shall  presently  see,  indeed,  the  Roman  Stoics 
suddenly  awaking  from  this  dream  of  philanthropy,  and  fling- 
ing themselves  again,  with  passionate  disappointment,  upon 
the  narrower  interests  which  constituted  the  strength  of  their 
fathers ; trying  indeed,  but  feebly  and  with  no  consistency, 
to  connect  the  duties  of  the  Roman  with  the  universal  spirit 
of  rectitude  and  holiness.  But  as  yet,  Stoicism,  in  the  ranks 
of  Roman  society,  was  merely  a speculative  creed ; and  the 
habit  now  prevalent  there,  of  speculating  on  the  unity  of 
mankind,  the  equality  of  races,  the  universality  of  justice,  the 
subjection  of  prince  and  people,  of  masters  and  slaves,  of  con- 
queror and  conquered,  to  one  rule  of  Right,  tended  undoubted- 
ly to  sap  the  exclusive  and  selfish  spirit  of  Roman  antiquity. 

It  was  by  his  position,  however,  at  the  head  of  the  dis- 
solute democracy  of  Rome,  that  Nero  was  taught  more  es- 
peciallv  to  divest  himself  of  the  ideas  and  motives 

1 . J „ 2d.  Of  Ms  po- 

which  seemed  to  become  the  offspring  of  the  eition  at  the 

-i-N  •••  -it  T -| . • . r . _ head  of  the  Eo- 

Homitn  and  the  Jum.  ihe  eminence,  mdeed,  to  mandemoc- 
whic-h  he  was  born  might  itself  preclude  him  ncy' 
from  ever  imbibing  them.  The  men  by  whom  his  infancy 
had  been  surrounded  were  slaves  and  freedmen,  chiefly  of 
Greek  extraction,  men  whose  lessons  of  life  and  manners 
were  pointed  doubtless  with  many  a gibe  at  the  decrepitude 
of  Latium  and  Sabellia,  with  proud  laudation  of  the  genius 
of  Hellenic  culture,  which  had  survived  so  many  conquests 
and  captivities,  and  laid  its  invisible  yoke  on  the  necks  of 
the  world’s  masters.  The  society  of  the  palace  displayed,  in 
striking  colours,  the  intellectual  superiority  of  the  Greeks ; 
and  Nero  was  led,  by  all  his  early  tuition,  to  regard  intel- 
lectual polish  as  the  true  end  of  civilization.  But  the  em- 

VOL  TI. — 8 


114 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  60. 


peror,  moreover,  was  the  representative  of  the  Roman  popu- 
lace ; of  that  hybrid  multitude  of  the  circus  and  the  baths, 
which  owed  no  fealty  to  the  traditions  of  the  forum  and  the 
camp.  These  were  the  natural  supporters  of  his  tribunitian 
power,  while  the  nobles,  the  true  blood  of  Rome,  might  be 
regarded  as  his  hereditary  enemies.  Even  the  names  of  his 
predecessors,  Tiberius  and  Caius,  might  remind  him  of  the 
tribunes  of  two  centuries  before,  the  champions  of  the  plebs 
against  the  optimates.  We  may  almost  imagine,  that  in  this 
prevalence  of  personal  over  family  appellations,  there  lingered 
yet  a reminiscence  of  the  popularity  of  the  Gracchi.1 

It  would  appear,  indeed,  that  while  the  nobles  had  no 
cause  of  quarrel  against  their  prince,  but  for  the  offence  he 
Nero’s  temper-  maJ  have  given  to  antique  prejudices,  they  al- 
fn^ases  ooity-  l°we(l  themselves  to  reflect  on  his  character  and 
esty  and  libel,  administration  in  terms  that  could  not  fail  to 
make  a breach  between  them.  Scandalous  as  the  vices  and 
the  amusements  of  Nero  had  now  become,  monstrous  as  were 
the  crimes  he  had  perpetrated  within  the  sphere  of  his  own 
family,  his  government  was  still  conducted  on  wholesome 
principles,  the  co-ordinate  powers  of  the  state  flourished  under 
his  tolerant  protection,  the  magistrates  were  held  in  honour, 
the  senate  bore  something  more  than  the  mere  semblance  of 
authority.  The  state  was  prosperous,  the  laws  were  respect- 
ed, public  criminals  were  punished,  virtue  and  moderation 
were  recognised  as  claims  to  reward.  TJnder  such  circum- 
stances, the  canker  of  internal  corruption,  the  absence  of  high 
principles,  might  be  concealed  from  the  eyes  of  ordinary 
observers ; and  it  may  be  doubted  whether  all  the  philosophy 
of  Rome  could  furnish  one  man  wise  enough  to  look  beneath 
the  surface,  and  detect  the  symptoms  of  national  decay  which 
really  lurked  there.  The  instincts  of  Christianity  alone  could 

1 The  indignant  allusion  of  Lucan  to  the  Drusi  and  Gracchi,  and  to  the 
supposed  exultation  of  their  shades  at  the  success  of  the  Caesarean  usurpation, 
is  not  uninstructive  (. Phars . vi.  in  fin.) : 

“ Vidi  ego  laetantes,  popularia  nomina,  Drusos ; 

Legibus  immodicos,  ausosque  ingentia  Gracchos.” 


A.  U.  815.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


115 


indicate  the  disease,  at  the  same  time  that  they  afforded  the 
remedy.  We  must  allow,  then,  that  justice  as  well  as  pru- 
dence should  have  repressed  the  selfish  jealousy  of  the  nobles; 
and  taught  them  at  least  to  tolerate  the  ruler  who  deserved 
well  of  the  republic.  But  it  would  seem  that  they  had  no 
such  self-control.  In  the  j^ear  815,  the  turning  point,  as  it  is 
commonly  regarded,  of  Nero’s  public  administration,  a praetor 
named  Antistius,  who  already,  as  tribune  of  the  plebs,  had 
shown  little  disposition  to  confine  himself  within  the  limits 
of  his  functions,  thought  fit  to  compose  verses  against  the 
emperor,  and  to  recite  them  in  a company  of  knights  and 
senators.  The  law  of  Majesty,  under  which  such  indecent 
raillery  would  have  met  with  speedy  punishment,  had  been 
set  aside  : Nero  piqued  himself  on  his  generous  discourage- 
ment of  the  informers.  But  the  flatterers  of  power  were 
ever  prompt  to  seize  an  opportunity  for  courting  it.  It  was 
easy  to  represent  that  the  safety  of  the  prince  required  pro- 
tection to  his  dignity.  A few  years  only  of  exemption  from 
the  shame  and  peril  of  delation  had  sufficed  to  blunt  the  sense 
of  its  enormities,  and  the  demand  now  made  by  the  courtly 
Capito  for  reviving  of  charges  of  Majesty,  seems  to  have  been 
hailed  by  all  with  blind  precipitation.  The  senate  assented 
without  serious  opposition  from  any  of  its  members.  But 
Capito  required,  further,  that  the  action  of  the  law  should  be 
retrospective.  The  ribaldry  of  Antistius,  he  protested,  was 
not  only  shocking,  but  dangerous.  The  safety  of  the  state, 
not  of  the  emperor  only,  required  an  example  to  be  made. 
The  stretch  of  legal  principle  for  his  punishment  was  well  de- 
served ; and  it  was  for  once  only.  Many  acquiesced  in  these 
violent  proceedings,  so  at  least  they  pretended,  to  give  the 
prince  an  opportunity  of  gracefully  absolving  his  maligner 
by  the  exercise  of  the  tribunitian  veto.  A consul  designate, 
inspired  by  this  refined  notion  of  flattery,  proposed  that  the 
culprit  should  be  stripped  of  his  praetorship  and  scourged  to 
death,  after  the  ancient  manner.  The  senators  ratified  the 
outrageous  sentence  with  headlong  ardour;  but  Pastus 
Thrasea  alone,  one  of  the  few  honest  men  among  them,  re- 


116 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  1).  62. 


fused  to  concur  in  it,  and  while  he  tempered  his  vote  with 
much  praise  of  the  emperor,  and  invectives  against  his  de- 
famer,  invoked  the  milder  punishment  of  exile  with  confisca- 
tion. This  temperate  counsel  had  a great  effect  on  the  impul- 
sive assembly,  ever  prone,  as  we  have  seen,  to  the  most  sud- 
den conversions,  and  devoid,  it  would  seem,  of  those  convic- 
tions and  principles,  the  possession  of  which  is  among  the 
most  essential  qualities  of  a deliberative  body.  It  was  de- 
termined to  proceed  no  further  without  first  ascertaining  the 
emperor’s  real  wishes  ; and  this  precipitate  flattery  ended  in 
placing  him  in  the  disagreeable  position  of  deciding  as  a judge 
on  a question  of  his  own  personal  dignity.  Nero  hastened 
to  refer  the  affair  again  to  the  senate,  not  omitting,  however, 
to  claim  some  credit  for  allowing  it  to  absolve  the  criminal. 
After  some  further  discussion,  Thrasea’s  firmness  prevailed ; 
and  the  senators  generally  acquiesced  in  his  vote  for  the 
minor  punishment.1  Patient  as  the  emperor  had  shown  him- 
self in  the  case  of  a libel  against  his  own  person,  he  bore,  as 
might  he  expected,  with  equal  composure,  the  publication  of 
scandalous  writings  against  the  senate.  When  a certain 
Fabricus  Yeiento  was  accused  of  putting  forth  offensive  libels 
against  the  fathers  and  the  pontiffs,  Nero,  to  whom  the  cog- 
nisance of  the  charge  was  referred  by  appeal,  again  declined 
to  interfere.  It  was  not  till  a fresh  indictment  was  presented 
against  the  culprit,  and  he  was  declared  to  have  trenched  on 
the  imperial  prerogatives,  and  even  to  have  sold  magistracies 
and  other  appointments,  that  the  chief  of  the  state  could  he 
induced  to  summon  him  before  his  tribunal.  Yeiento  was 
banished  from  Italy ; his  books,  the  original  subject  of  com- 
plaint, were  ordered  to  be  burnt,  and  it  was  declared  crim- 
inal to  read  or  possess  them.  As  long  as  this  interdict  lay 
upon  them  they  were  sought  for  with  ardour ; but  when  it 
was  shortly  afterwards  removed,  they  soon  ceased  to  attract 
curiosity.3 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  48.  For  the  turbulent  character  of  this  man,  called  else- 
where {Ann.  xiii.  53. ; xvi.  10.)  L.  Yetus,  see  xiii.  28. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  50. : “ Conquisitos  lectitatosque,  donee  cum  periculo  para- 
bantur,  mox  licentia  habendi  oblivionem  attulit.” 


A.  U.  815.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


117 


To  those  who,  with  the  hitter  experience  of  past  years, 
foresaw  that  the  first  step,  however  hesitating,  in  the  direc- 
tion of  tyranny,  must  rapidly  lead  to  a revival  of  ^ , 

J r J . Death  of  Burr- 

its  pristine  terrors,  even  these  indications  of  1m-  hus  ascribed  to 

7 . . . poison. 

penal  jealousy  might  serve  as  a warning.  Hut 
the  young  Caesar’s  progress  in  dissipation  and  expense  gave 
nearer  cause  for  apprehension.  The  wasteful  extravagance 
of  his  first  eight  years  could  not  have  been  maintained  with 
pure  hands,  had  he  not  found  in  the  coffers  of  his  predecessor 
the  accumulated  treasures  of  a reign  of  carefulness  and  mod- 
eration. Though  no  friendly  voice  has  deigned  to  signalize 
the  economy  of  Claudius,  this  fact  seems  alone  sufficient  to 
establish  it,  and  to  add  another  to  the  various  circumstances 
which  impugn  the  common  notion  of  his  imbecility,  and  the 
unchecked  rapacity  of  his  ministers.  But  the  descent  from 
dissipation  to  extravagance,  from  extravagance  to  want,  from 
want  to  violence  and  tyranny,  was  inevitable.  It  could  only 
be  a question  of  time.  The  profusion  of  the  prince  would 
surely  grow  with  indulgence ; his  treasury  must  stand  always 
empty,  and  unlimited  power  would  not  long  be  baulked  of 
the  means  of  replenishing  it.  Such  was  the  gloomy  prospect 
before  the  nobles,  when,  the  first  to  apprehend  as  the  first  to 
feel  the  tyranny  of  their  autocrat,  they  saw  with  dismay  the 
death  of  Burrhus  and  the  removal  therewith  of  the  strongest 
bulwark  against  the  encroachments  of  unthrifty  despotism. 
Rumours  of  poison  were  whispered  among  them,  and  symp- 
toms were  reported  which  gave  colour  to  the  suspicion. 
Nero,  it  was  related,  had  repeatedly  come  to  the  sick  man’s 
bedside,  to  inquire  after  his  health ; but  he  could  extort  from 
him  no  thanks  for  this  solicitude,  no  frank  avowal  of  his  suf- 
ferings, but  only  the  dry  answer,  I am  doing  well.1  But, 
however  this  may  be,  neither  symptoms  nor  rumours  had  so 
much  effect  on  the  general  belief  as  the  apprehensions  excited 
by  the  character  of  the  personages  between  whom  N ero  di- 
vided the  military  command  which  had  reposed  in  the  hands 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  51. 


118 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  62. 


of  Burrhus.  Fenius  Rufus  was  timid  and  indolent,  ready  to 
please  either  prince  or  people  by  any  base  acquiescence:  but 
Elevation  of  Ti-  the  wickedness  of  Tigellinus  was  more  active ; al- 
geiimus.  ready  infamous  as  the  partner  of  his  master’s  de- 
baucheries, he  became  the  worst  adviser  of  his  tyranny,  and 
the  willing  instrument  of  his  cruelties.1  Such  were  the  min- 
isters to  whom  Nero  instinctively  resorted,  a bad  man  and  a 
weak  man ; the  one  to  contrive  crimes,  the  other  to  sanction 
them.  And  at  this  moment  he  might  have  a special  motive 
for  ridding  himself  of  a brave  and  honest  adviser ; for  he  was 
meditating  a divorce  from  Octavia,  which  Burrhus  sturdily 
Opposed  as  unjust  and  impolitic.  When  urged  by  the  em- 
peror to  accede  to  it,  he  had  bluntly  replied  (such  at  least 
was  the  reply  the  Romans  delighted  to  ascribe  to  him) : If 
you  dismiss  the  daughter  of  Claudius , restore  at  least  the  em- 
pire which  was  her  dowry? 

The  death  of  Burrhus  helped  to  break  down  the  influence 
of  Seneca  also.  This  result,  however,  flowed  in  a great  meas- 
Seneca  at-  ure  from  the  blind  jealousy  of  the  nobles  them- 
drawfrom^ub-  selves.  It  was  natural  that  they  should  regard 
Ee  life.  as  an  UpStart  the  provincial,  the  sophist,  the  son 

of  the  grammarian : they  might  cavil  at  the  liberality  of  his 
views,  and  impugn  his  influence  as  pernicious.  From  them, 
probably,  came  the  accusations  which  were  now  heaped  on 
the  surviving  guardian  of  Nero’s  innocence,  and  which  Nero 
showed  himself  little  anxious  to  baffle.  The  riches  Seneca 
had  acquired  were  imputed  to  him  as  a crime ; it  was  insinu- 
ated that  the  frugal  sage  had  amassed  them  to  hatch  treason 
and  corrupt  the  populace.  It  was  pretended  moreover  that 
he  vaunted  himself  the  prince’s  master  in  eloquence  and 

1 Tac.  1.  c.  Dion,  Ixii.  13.  This  seems  to  have  been  the  first  occasion  of 
dividing  the  prefecture  between  two,  the  plan  recommended  by  Maecenas  ac- 
cording to  Dion  (lii.  24.) : rtiv  6e  6r)  'nnricjv  Svo  rovg  apiarovg  rijQ  Kept  oe 
tppovpac  apxeiv. 

8 Both  Dion  and  Suetonius  ascribe  the  death  of  Burrhus  more  confidently 
to  poison.  The  former  writer  remarks  the  rude  freedom  of  speech  in  which 
the  prefect  indulged  (lxii.  13.). 


A.  U.  815.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


119 


poetry,  disparaging  at  the  same  time  the  excellence  he  could 
not  hope  to  rival  in  music  and  charioteering.  Nero’s  petty 
and  vindictive  spirit  was  an  instrument  easily  played  upon. 
Seneca  was  not  blind  to  the  shy  consciousness  which  shunned 
his  presence.  Fear  and  habit  alone  continued  to  preserve  his 
life.  Now  was  the  time  to  take  the  course  which  he  had  long 
meditated,  as  the  means  of  escaping  from  danger.  He  plead- 
ed age  and  ill  health,  and  demanded  leave  to  withdraw  from 
court ; at  the  same  time  he  offered  to  relinquish  the  wealth 
which  rendered  him,  as  he  knew,  most  obnoxious.  Such 
tokens  of  distrust  alarmed  Nero.  He  set  himself  to  caress 
and  cajole ; his  blandishments  were  fascinating,  but  his  en- 
treaties were  in  fact  commands ; and  Seneca  found  his  escape 
cut  off,  without  being  for  a moment  deceived  as  to  the  im- 
minence of  his  peril.  Muttering  to  himself  or  his  friends  the 
wisest  maxims  of  his  school,  he  renounced  all  outward  show, 
either  of  wealth  or  influence,  and  pretended  to  devote  him- 
self more  earnestly  than  ever  to  philosophic  abstraction.1 

Although  the  ostensible  authority  over  the  praetorians 
might  be  divided  between  Rufus  and  Tigellinus,  it  was  not 
long  before  the  entire  confidence  of  the  emperor  Patal  inflnenc0 
was  given  to  a single  favourite.  Rufus,  indeed,  of  Tigellinus- 
owed  his  elevation  primarily  to  the  good-will  of  the  populace, 
to  whom  he  was  endeared  by  the  liberality  in  dispensing  their 
dole  of  grain  without  making  a profit  himself ; he  had  also 
been  admitted  to  the  friendship  of  Agrippina ; and  on  both 
these  accounts  became  an  object  of  suspicion  to  Nero.  But 
his  colleague,  a man  of  obscure  birth  and  of  no  pretensions  to 
distinction  or  popularity,  was  better  fitted  to  obtain  a tyrant’s 
confidence.  This  confidence  once  acquired  he  sought  suc- 
cessfully to  keep  by  humouring  the  prince’s  passions,  and 
plunging  him  into  crimes  on  the  plea  of  safety  and  necessity. 

The  first  victims  to  this  man’s  intrigues  were  Plautus  and 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  53-56.  The  fears  of  Seneca  and  the  artifices  of  Nero  are 
set  forth  in  a dialogue  between  them.  Our  dramatic  fabulist  never  wears  the 
historian’s  veil  more  loosely  than  in  this  scene,  which  assuredly  was  never 
acted,  and  still  less  could  have  been  reported. 


120 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


f A.  D.  62. 


Sulla,  personages  of  higli  rank  and  consideration,  of  whom 
Execution  of  ^ er°,  as  the  favourite  knew,  was  painfully  j ealous. 

tasband()or-lau’  Rubellius  Plautus,  whose  relation  to  the  imperial 
neiius  Suiia.  family  has  been  before  noticed,  was  generally  re- 
spected for  his  character;  his  name  was  connected  accord- 
ingly with  the  plot  which  Silana  had  ventured  to  impute  to 
Agrippina ; and  recently  on  the  appearance  of  a comet  which 
was  supposed  to  portend  the  fall  of  the  reigning  prince,  it 
was  to  him  that  they  had  turned  their  eyes  as  the  fittest  and 
most  natural  successor.1  Nero  had  recommended  his  kins- 
man to  remove  from  Rome  to  his  estates  in  Asia ; and  here 
Plautus  had  resided  since  813  with  his  wife  and  a modest 
retinue  of  slaves,  abstaining  from  all  participation  in  affairs. 
Still  Nero  watched  him  with  anxiety,  while  Tigellinus  con- 
tinued to  insist  upon  the  birth,  the  wealth,  and  the  reputation 
of  the  exile,  and  the  proximity  of  his  retreat  to  the  armies  of 
Syria.  It  was  determined  in  secret  conclave  that  his  life 
should  be  taken,  and  for  this  purpose  $ centurion  with  sixty 
soldiers,  under  the  orders  of  an  eunuch  of  the  palace,  was  de- 
spatched from  Rome.  Sulla,  meanwhile,  had  been  removed 
to  Massilia:  he  was  poor  while  Plautus  was  rich;  he  was 
despiable  in  character,  while  Plautus  was  highly  esteemed ; 
but  the  nobility  of  his  descent  and  the  name  of  the  great  dic- 
tator could  be  objected  against  him,  and  the  Germanic  legions, 
it  was  thought,  might  possibly  attach  themselves  to  him. 
Such  were  the  alarms  of  the  unwarlike  stripling,  who  kept 
a handful  of  guards  in  his  service  only  by  largesses  and 
caresses.2  Sulla’s  fate  was  soon  decided.  It  required  but 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  19.  xiv.  22. : “ Quasi  jam  depulso  Nerone,  quisnam  delige- 
retur  anquirebant ; et  omnium  ore  Rubellius  Plautus  celebrabatur.” 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  5*7. : “Propinquos  huic  (Mentis,  illi  Germanise  exer- 
citus  ....  erectas  Gallias  ad  nomen  dictatorium.”  The  Narbonensis,  as 
has  been  remarked  more  than  once  in  the  course  of  this  history,  was  closely 
connected  with  the  old  senatorial  party  under  Pompeius,  Domitius,  and  Fon- 
teius.  It  is  curious  to  find  this  connexion  again  referred  to,  after  all  the  pains 
the  Caesars  had  taken  to  undo  it.  It  is  not  impossible  that  the  democratic  em- 
peror may  have  been  reminded  of  it  by  the  recent  attempt  of  Gaetulicus  to  as- 
sert his  independence  in  that  quarter. 


A.  U.  815.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


121 


six  days  for  Nero’s  myrmidons  to  reach  the  coast  of  Gaul, 
and  the  exile  was  already  slain  and  his  head  brought  to  the 
emperor,  while  the  murderers  of  Plautus  were  still  on  their 
journey.  As  soon  as  it  was  known  in  the  city  that  this  pre- 
cious life  was  also  in  danger,  some  of  his  kinsmen  hastened 
to  advertise  him,  and  their  warnings,  with  exhortations  to 
resist  and  dare  the  worst,  reached  him  before  the  messengers 
of  death  arrived.  It  seems  strange,  indeed,  that  the  victim 
should  have  made  no  effort  to  escape  or  to  resist.1  All  Asia  lay 
before  him  for  flight : the  legions  of  the  East  were  command- 
ed by  Corbulo,  whose  fame  made  him  odious  to  the  emperor. 
But  Plautus  was  unmoved : whether  he  despaired  of  escaping 
or  defending  himself,  or  was  actually  weary  of  the  suspense 
of  his  position,  or  whether  he  hoped  by  submission  to  avert 
the  confiscation  of  his  patrimony,  he  calmly  pursued  his  ex- 
ercises and  studies,  and  was  found  at  last  by  his  assassins 
unrobed  for  the  games  of  the  palaestra.  The  eunuch  looked 
on  while  the  centurion  struck  the  victim’s  head  off.  When 
the  trophy  was  brought  to  Rome,  Nero  is  said  to  have  ex- 
claimed, that  he  was  now  free  to  effect  his  marriage  with 
Poppaea,  without  fear  of  a rival  to  profit  by  the  public  com- 
miseration for  Octavia.  But  he  pretended  to  be  delivered 
from  two  dangerous  adversaries,  and  required  the  senate  to 
congratulate  him,  and  decree  a thanksgiving  for  the  state 
preserved  and  a revolution  averted.2 

Thus  at  the  close  of  the  eighth  year  of  his  principate  did 
Nero  exhibit  himself,  almost  without  disguise,  as  a vulgar 
tyrant,  timid  and  sanguinary,  cutting  off  one  by  one  the  most 

1 Many  of  my  readers  will  remember  Gibbon’s  remark,  and  the  striking 
note  appended  to  it : “ To  resist  was  fatal ; and  it  was  impossible  to  fly.  . . . 
Under  Tiberius  a Roman  knight  attempted  to  fly  to  the  Parthians.  He  was 
stopped  in  the  straits  of  Sicily ; but  so  little  danger  did  there  appear  in  the 
example  that  the  most  jealous  of  tyrants  disdained  to  punish  it.”  See  Tac. 
Ann.  vi.  14.  Nevertheless  the  explanation  must  be  felt  to  be  unsatisfactory. 
I can  only  refer,  in  addition,  1.  to  the  gross  apathy  with  regard  to  death  in 
which  the  Romans  were  now  generally  sunk ; and  2.  to  their  singular  abhor- 
rence of  exile  among  strangers. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  57-59. 


122 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  62. 


„ , , eminent  around  him  in  station  or  virtue.  From 

Further  devel- 
opment of  Ne-  this  time  no  senator  could  fail  to  see  that  his 

ro’s  cruelty.  , . 

own  Me  hung  only  on  the  caprice  of  a master, 
and  of  the  creatures  who  surrounded  him.  It  was  impossible 
for  him  to  impose  on  himself,  any  more  than  on  the  prince, 
by  the  abject  servility  of  his  adulation.  Yet  having  once 
devoted  himself  to  soothing  the  monster  by  caresses,  all  his 
moral  courage  deserted  him;  condemned  by  his  own  con- 
science, he  had  no  prop  to  lean  on ; there  seemed  no  other 
course  for  him  but  to  repeat  and  daily  increase  the  dose  of 
flattery,  to  crouch  more  obsequiously  under  every  act  of 
cruelty  and  oppression ; only  to  hope  that  his  own  turn  of 
suffering  might  come  the  last.  Seneca’s  influence  was  gone. 
It  is  some  satisfaction  to  believe  that  the  crimes  which  fol- 
lowed were  neither  suggested  nor  excused  by  this  preacher 
of  expediency ; and  we  may  hope  that,  at  last,  when  his  doc- 
trines were  reproved  by  the  result,  he  learnt  to  detest  the 
subterfuges  under  which  he  had  sheltered  his  own  dereliction 
from  honesty  and  virtue.  The  tyrant’s  passions  now  ranged 
unrestrained.  The  crime  he  had  long  prepared  was  about  to 
be  consummated.  To  the  child- wife  to  whom  he  was  united, 
he  never  felt  nor  pretended  attachment.  Their  cohabitation 
had  been  brief  and  barren.  Octavia  was  too  art- 
less to  raise  any  obstacle  to  his  licentious  amours. 
Yet,  as  the  daughter  of  Messalina,  even  her  existence  would 
remind  him  of  the  crimes  which  had  raised  him  to  power ; as 
the  child  of  Claudius,  the  people,  with  their  usual  caprice, 
might  lavish  upon  her  the  favour  they  had  withheld  from  her 
father.  To  these  obvious  motives  for  jealousy  was  added  the 
fierce  ambition  of  Poppsea,  who  demanded  of  her  lover  the 
last  proof  of  his  devotion.  Still  some  pretext  was  necessary, 
and  the  barrenness  of  the  deserted  wife  was  alleged  as  a rea- 
son for  repudiating  her.  She  was  required  to  remove  from 
the  palace ; but  at  the  same  time  the  house  of  Burrhus  and 
the  estates  of  Plautus  were,  with  a show  of  liberality,  assign- 
ed to  her.  The  marriage  with  Popptea  followed  only  twelve 
days  later.  The  intruder  was  now  in  a position  to  destroy 


Fall  of  Octavia. 


A.  U.  815.  J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


123 


the  victim  she  had  injured.  She  contrived  an  accusation 
against  her  of  adultery  with  a slave  ; her  maids  were  tortured 
to  extort  evidence  of  her  guilt ; and  Tigellinus  paid  court  to 
the  reigning  favourite  by  presiding  at  the  foul  examination. 
Well  did  he  earn  the  scathing  sarcasm  which  clings  like  the 
shirt  of  Xessus  to  his  name.1  Tet  the  pretended  revelations 
thus  odiously  obtained  hardly  gave  a colour  to  the  harsh 
measure  of  sending  her  to  a place  of  custody  in  Campania ; 
and  when  the  populace,  excited  by  such 'great  and  unmerited 
misfortunes,  murmured  against  the  decree,  Xero  found  it  ne- 
cessary to  recall  her.  Thereupon  the  citizens  rushed  tumultu- 
ously to  the  Capitol,  to  sacrifice  to  the  national  divinities ; 
they  overthrew  all  the  statues  of  Poppsea  within  their  reach, 
while  they  crowned  Octavia’s  with  flowers.  They  crowded 
about  the  palace,  and  filled  its  courts : the  emperor  dispersed 
them  with  a military  force,  and  replaced  the  images  of  his 
paramour.  Tet  he  dared  not  persist  in  this  defiance : trem- 
bling and  irresolute,  he  neither  dared  to  retain  Poppcea  in  the 
palace,  nor  could  he  determine  to  restore  Octavia  to  her  place 
and  rights.  If,  while  still  absent  in  Campania,  her  name 
alone  sufficed  to  raise  a tumult,  what,  he  asked,  might  be  the 
effect  of  her  actual  return  to  the  city?  But  the  charges 
hitherto  made  against  her  had  failed  of  reasonable  proof: 
even  if  proved,  an  intrigue  with  a slave  deserved,  in  Roman 
eyes,  neither  the  name  nor  punishment  of  treason.  Another 
charge  must  be  invented,  another  connexion,  more  capable 
of  such  an  imputation,  must  be  fabricated.  Xero  had  long 
loathed  the  sight  of  Anicetus,  the  contriver  of  his  mother’s 
murder.  Strange  to  relate,  he  induced  him,  by  extraordinary 
promises,  to  avow  an  amour  with  the  wretched  princess.  For 
the  present  he  must  be  banished,  for  appearance’  sakevto  an 
island ; but  he  should  reap  ample  rewards  at  a later  period. 
This  confession  was  enough.  A charge  not  of  adultery,  but 
of  Majesty,  was  founded  upon  it ; for  the  captain  of  the  fleet 
was  capable  of  guilty  aspirations;  and,  with  additional  in- 


1 Tac,  Ann.  xiv.  60.  Dion,  lii.  13. 


124 


HISTORF  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  62. 


Her  banish- 
ment 


suits  to  her  outraged  innocence,  Octavia  was  im- 
prisoned in  Pandateria.  F amiliar  as  the  Romans 
had  now  become  with  the  banishment  of  grave  and  noble 
matrons,  they  were  not  insensible  to  the  cruel  aggravations 
of  her  lot.  The  Caesarean  princesses  who  had  thus  suffered 
before  her,  the  Julias  and  Agrippinas,  had  at  least  attained 
the  strength  and  fortitude  of  mature  years;  they  had  seen 
some  happy  days  ; they  had  the  consolation,  for  such  it  was 
regarded  in  the  creed  of  Paganism,  of  reflecting  in  their  sor- 
row that  they  had  had  a portion,  at  least,  of  the  common  en- 
joyments of  life.  But  to  Octavia  her  marriage  had  been  no 
other  than  a funeral : led  as  she  was  to  a house  where  every- 
thing was  funereal  and  fatal ; where  her  father,  and  soon  after- 
wards her  brother,  had  been  poisoned;  where  a maid  had 
become  more  powerful  than  her  mistress ; where  a paramour 
had  supplanted  the  lawful  spouse ; lastly,  where  she  had  been 
branded  with  a crime  more  hateful  to  her  than  the  worst  of 
deaths.1 

The  poor  child  had  not  yet  attained  her  twentieth  birth- 
day, when,  encompassed  by  soldiers  and  centurions,  she  au- 
gured too  surely  that  the  days  of  her  existence 
were  numbered.  Still  clinging  with  agony  to 
life,  she  proclaimed  in  vain  that  she  was  now  no  more  than 
Caesar’s  widow,  no  more  than  his  sister,  and  invoked  the 
names  of  their  common  kindred,  the  offspring  of  Germanicus, 
the  name  of  Agrippina  herself,  during  whose  power  her  union, 
if  unhappy,  had  at  least  been  protected.  After  a few  days 
she  was  seized  and  bound,  and  her  veins  opened  with  the 
knife ; she  fainted,  and  the  blood  refused  to  flow ; she  was 
finally  stifled  by  the  fumes  of  a warm  bath.  Her  head  was 
severed  from  her  body,  and  carried  to  the  cruel  Poppasa. 
Yows  and  sacrifices  were  offered  to  the  gods  by  a decree  of 
the  senate;  and  so,  says  the  historian,  we  are  henceforth 


Her  death. 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  63. : “ Nuptiarum  dies  loco  funeris  fuit,  deduct®  in  do- 
mum  in  qua  nihil  nisi  luctuosum  haberet,  erepto  per  venenum  patre  et  statim 
fratre : turn  ancilla  domina  validior ; et  Poppasa  non  nisi  in  pemiciem  uxoris 
nupta : postremo  crimen  omni  exitio  gravius.” 


A.  U.  815.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


125 


to  understand,  without  special  mention,  that  whenever  any 
atrocious  barbarity  was  perpetrated  by  the  emperor,  the  tri- 
umph of  his  personal  selfishness  was  celebrated  with  the  same 
ceremonies  as  had  once  signalized  the  victories  of  the  Roman 
people. 

Nero  had  now  cleared  away  all  partners  or  rivals  of  his 
power  in  his  own  family.  He  remained  alone,  the  last  of  a 
race  which  he  was  not  destined  to  perpetuate.  Nevertheless, 
his  causes  of  apprehension  were  not  removed  by  these  hide- 
ous massacres.  He  had  exchanged  the  jealousy  of  a kinsman 
for  the  enmity  of  the  whole  world.  He  turned  from  nobler 
victims  to  the  vain  and  wealthy  freedmen  of  his  own  house- 
hold. Doryphorus,  the  secretary  of  the  palace,  Prosecution  of 
was  put  to  death  for  the  opposition  he  had  pre- 
sumed to  offer  to  the  nuptials  of  Poppaea ; unless, 
indeed,  the  riches  he  had  amassed  in  the  imperial  service 
were  the  real  cause  of  his  destruction,  as  of  that  of  Pallas,  for 
whose  natural  death,  aged  as  he  now  was,  the  prince  was 
tired  of  waiting.1  The  wealth  of  Seneca,  also,  for  he  still  had 
the  reputation  of  wealth,  tempted  Nero’s  cupidity;  and  he 
listened  eagerly  to  accusations  of  conspiracy  which  the  flat- 
terers of  power  contrived  to  forge  against  the  fallen  minister. 
But  the  charge  against  him  in  connexion  with  the 

...  . ® . . Charge  against 

illustrious  Piso  was  at  least  premature;  it  was  Seneca rebut- 

triumphantly  rebutted,  and  the  prince  acquiesced 
reluctantly  in  his  escape  for  a season.  The  man  of  peace  was 
provoked  at  last  to  self-defence.  Piso,  awakened  to  his  dan- 
ger, embarked  soon  afterwards  in  a real  conspiracy,  and  we 
shall  have  reason  to  suspect  that  Seneca  himself  was  not  un- 
connected with  that  formidable  enterprise.2 

The  prodigality  of  the  emperor’s  pastimes  was  thus  driv- 
ing him  to  the  sanguinary  measures  by  which  tyrants  fill 
their  coffers ; and  the  discovery  how  easy  was  the  process, 
how  submissive  were  the  victims,  prompted  him  to  indulge 
his  passions  without  restraint.  His  licentiousness  became 


■wealthy  freed- 
men,  Dorypho- 
rus and  Pallas. 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  65. 


3 Ibid. 


126 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  63. 


now  as  reckless  as  his  cruelty.  He  had  sunk  already  to  the 
degradation  of  singing  and  playing  in  public ; hut  there  was 
still  a lower  depth  which  his  abandoned  tastes  and  thirst  for 
vulgar  admiration  tempted  him  to  fathom.  As  a child  his 
talk  had  been  of  the  Greens  and  Blues ; his  counters  had  been 
cars  of  ivory.  The  passion,  checked  by  his  preceptors,  had 
been  cherished  up  to  manhood,  and  since  he  had  become  his 
own  master  he  had  thrown  off  gradually  all  restraint  in  in- 
Nero  drives  his  bulging  it.  From  his  private  circus  in  the  gar- 
SrasMaxi-  dens  t^ie  Vatican,  from  the  arena  of  Grecian 

mus-  colonies  in  Campania,  he  descended  at  last  to  the 

Circus  Maximus  at  Rome,  and,  placing  a freedman  in  the  im- 
perial tribune  to  fling  the  kerchief  for  a signal,  drove  his 
chariot  victoriously  round  the  goal,  before  the  eyes  of  200,000 
citizens.  The  rabble  greeted  him  with  delight ; so  soon  had 
they  forgotten  their  sympathy  with  Octavia;  so  heedless 
were  they  of  the  shame  of  their  country.  The  senators 
clapped  their  hands  reluctantly,  shuddering  the  while  at  the 
downfall  of  ancient  principles,  and  trembling  at  every  shout 
for  their  own  lives  and  fortunes.1 

Nero  had  proposed  at  this  period  to  visit  Greece  and  Egypt, 
but,  when  he  renounced  this  intention,  he  assigned  as  a rea- 
son his  people’s  wish  to  retain  him  among  them 
as  the  leader  of  all  their  amusements.  Possibly 
they  apprehended, — so  completely  did  they  now 
regard  the  emperor’s  presence  as  the  pledge  of 
their  subsistence, — that  in  his  absence  the  regu- 
lar supplies  of  the  city  would  be  impeded  or  withheld.2  It 
was  this  general  conviction  of  the  necessity  of  the  Prince  to 
the  Subject,  that  assured  him  of  their  protection,  and  made 
him  so  formidable  to  the  helpless  senate.  To  attempt  the 
life  of  Caesar,  tyrant  and  monster  though  he  might  be,  was 


Nero’s  presence 
at  Rome  de- 
sired both  by 
the  populace 
and  the  senate. 

a.  d.  63. 
a.  tt.  816. 


1 Suet.  JVer.  22.  The  date  of  this  odious  exhibition  cannot  be  fixed  pre- 
cisely. It  must  have  been  later  than  the  institution  of  the  Neronia  in  813,  and 
before  817,  from  an  anecdote  in  Tacitus.  (Ann.  xv.  44.) 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  36. : “ Talia  plebi  volentia  fuere,  voluptatum,  cupidine,  et 
quae  praecipua  cura  est,  rei  frumentariae  augustias,  si  abesset,  metuenti.” 


A.  U.  816.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


127 


an  outrage  on  the  lives  and  fortunes  of  the  people  whose  ex- 
istence was  hound  up  with  his.  Distracted  by  apprehensions 
on  either  side,  the  senators  knew  not  whether  to  wish  for 
their  master’s  absence  or  his  presence  among  them ; but  in 
Rome  he  was  at  least  the  guardian  of  public  tranquillity,  and 
this  tranquillity,  by  his  name,  his  guards,  or  his  largesses,  he 
contrived  successfully  to  maintain. 

Never,  on  the  other  hand,  were  the  citizens  so  good- 
humoured,  as  when  they  saw  their  prince  enjoying  himself 
among  them.  The  prince  too,  on  his  part,  wish-  infamou8  de- 
ed it  to  appear  that  he  was  never  so  happy  as  Sy^nToS?" 
when  exhibiting  his  private  pleasures  to  the  eyes  aged  by  Nero* 
of  his  people.  The  banquets  he  gave  were  no  longer  to  be 
hidden  in  the  recesses  of  the  palace.  In  the  Campus  Martius, 
in  the  Circus  Maximus,  in  the  theatres  and  other  open  places, 
a series  of  entertainments  rapidly  followed:  and  not  here 
only,  but  in  every  public  spot  in  the  city,  the  emperor’s  table 
was  spread  from  day  to  day,  and  all  the  world  was  welcome 
to  see  him  dine,  if  not  to  partake  of  his  dinner.  Nor  were 
gluttony  and  drinking  the  only  intemperance  he  thus  shame- 
lessly practised  and  more  shamelessly  displayed.  To  such 
degradation  had  he  reduced  the  citizens,  that  they  were 
not  offended  by  the  most  naked  exhibitions  of  wantonness. 
Whatever  allowance  we  may  make  for  the  indignant  exag- 
gerations of  later  moralists,  or  for  the  prurient  imaginations 
of  the  narrators,  it  seems  impossible  to  question  the  fact  of 
the  prostitution  he  encouraged,  ordered,  and  even  compelled. 
To  Tigellinus  was  ascribed  the  most  monstrous  of  all  his  in- 
ventions. On  one  occasion,  a table  was  spread  for  the  em- 
peror and  his  guests  on  a raft  in  the  Basin  of  Agrippa,  and 
numerous  vessels,  decked  with  gold,  silver,  and  ivory,  attend- 
ed with  the  materials  and  ministers  of  the  repast.  The  colon- 
nades which  encircled  the  water  were  filled  partly  with  in- 
vited spectators ; but  certain  places  were  reserved  for  women 
of  all  ranks,  even  for  matrons  and  virgins,  w^ho  were  sur- 
rendered to  them  without  reserve.  Finally,  one  day  Nero? 
who  had  already  thrown  off  all  restraints  of  decency  and 


128 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  64. 


self-respect  in  liis  own  person,  went  through  the  marriage 
ceremony,  arrayed  in  veil,  necklace,  and  girdle,  before  the 
priests  and  soothsayers,  with  the  vilest  of  his  male  associates.1 

Let  this  suffice : — such  things  have  occurred,  perhaps,  in 
other  times  and  other  places ; perhaps  they  have  been  re- 
corded by  historians  as  well  as  satirists  : but  the  foul  annals 
of  the  period  before  us  have  attained  an  unfortunate  distinc- 
tion from  the  genius  which  has  been  engaged  in  illustrating 
them.  While  the  world  endures,  the  iniquities  of  Nero  will 
retain  their  pre-eminence  in  infamy,  and  it  will  be  equally  im- 
possible to  recount  them  at  length,  or  to  pass  them  over  in 
silence. 

But  in  the  midst  of  these  horrors,  which  steeped  in  the 
same  fearful  guilt  the  people  and  the  prince  together,  Prov- 
idence was  preparing  an  awful  chastisement ; and 

Great  confla-  _ *r  r ® 

g-ationin  was  about  to  overwhelm  home,  like  the  Cities  of 
the  Plain,  in  a sheet  of  retributive  fire.  Crowd- 
ed, as  the  mass  of  the  citizens  were,  in  their  close  wooden 
dwelling-chambers,  accidents  were  constantly  occurring  which 
involved  whole  streets  and  quarters  of  the  city  in  wide- 
spreading  conflagrations,  and  the  efforts  of  the  night-watch  to 
stem  these  outbursts  of  fire,  with  few  of  the  appliances,  and 
little  perhaps  even  of  the  discipline,  of  our  modern  police, 
were  but  imperfectly  effectual.  But  the  greatest  of  all  the 
fires  which  desolated  Borne  was  that  which  broke  out  on  the 
19th  of  July,  in  the  year  817,  the  tenth  of  Nero,  which  began 
at  the  eastern  end  of  the  Circus,  abutting  on  the  valley  be- 
tween the  Palatine  and  the  Cselian  hills.3  Against  the  outer 


1 The  reader  may  compare  for  himself  Tac.  Ann.  xv.  37. ; Suet.  Ner.  27- 
29. ; Dion,  lxii.  15.  It  is  not  worth  while  to  point  out  some  apparent  discrep- 
ancies, or  suggest  possible  exaggerations,  especially  in  Dion’s  account : kcu  fjv 
et-ow'ia  Tcavrl  ri J fiovTiofiEVO)  oxe~LV  Vv  ffi&ev " ov  yap  kt-ijv  avroig  ovt?  eva  cnrapv- 
fjcacOai : which  is  followed  by  a trait  of  nature  which  redeems  it  from  utter 
incredibility : udiapoi  re  teal  ir Irjyal  nal  ■&6pv6oi  ....  ical  avdreg  re  e/c 
tovtuv  cvxvol  Ecpdapr/oav.  Modern  writers,  as  usual,  have  taken  the  most  un- 
favourable view,  and  have  supposed  the  entertainment  in  Agrippa’s  Basin  to 
have  been  open  to  all  the  world. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  38. : “ Initium  in  ea  parte  Circi  ortum  quae  Palatino  Caelio. 


A.  U.  817.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


129 


walls  of  this  edifice  leaned  a mass  of  wooden  booths  and 
stores  filled  chiefly  with  combustible  articles.  The  wind  from 
the  east  drove  the  flames  towards  the  corner  of  the  Palatine, 
whence  they  forked  in  two  directions,  following  the  draught 
of  the  valleys.  At  neither  point  were  they  encountered  by 
the  massive  masonry  of  halls  or  temples,  till  they  had  gained 
such  head,  that  the  mere  intensity  of  the  heat  crumbled  brick 
and  stone  like  paper.  The  Circus  itself  was  filled  from  end 
to  end  with  wooden  galleries,  along  which  the  fire  coursed 
with  a speed  which  defied  all  check  and  pursuit.  The  flames 
shot  up  to  the  heights  adjacent,  and  swept  the  basements  of 
many  noble  structures  on  the  Palatine  and  Aventine.  Again 
they  plunged  into  the  lowest  levels  of  the  city,  the  dense 
habitations  and  narrow  winding  streets  of  the  Yelabrumand 
Forum  Boarium,  till  stopped  by  the  river  and  the  walls.  At 
the  same  time  another  torrent  rushed  towards  the  Yelia  and 
the  Esquiline,  and  sucked  up  all  the  dwellings  within  its 
reach,  till  it  was  finally  arrested  by  the  cliffs  beneath  the 
gardens  of  Maecenas.  Amidst  the  horror  and  confusion  of 
the  scene,  the  smoke,  the  blaze,  the  din,  and  the  scorching 
heat,  with  half  the  population,  bond  and  free,  cast  loose  and 
houseless  into  the  streets,  ruffians  were  seen  to  thrust  blazing 
brands  into  the  buildings,  who  affirmed,  when  seized  by  the 
indignant  sufferers,  that  they  were  acting  with  orders ; and 
the  crime,  which  was  probably  the  desperate  resource  of 
slaves  and  robbers,  was  imputed  by  fierce  suspicions  to  the 
government  itself.1 

que  montibus  contigua  est  . . . . simul  coeptus  ignis  ....  longitudi- 
nem  Circi  corripuit.”  In  the  second  clause  the  word  Circus  evidently  means 
the  edifice  so  called,  and,  accordingly,  I give  the  same  interpretation  to  it  in  the 
first.  But  no  part  of  the  Circus  can  properly  be  said  to  adjoin  the  Palatine 
and  the  Cselian ; and  I think  it  possible  that  in  the  first  passage  Tacitus  means, 
not  the  building,  but  the  quarter  of  the  city  which  went  by  the  name  of  Circus 
Maximus.  Dion  Hal.  (iii.  68.)  describes  the  Circus  and  its  exterior  galleries : 
egodev  irepi  tov  lit  tt6S popov  ere  pa  ar6a  povdareyog  kpyaarr/pia  exovcra  kv  airy 
nal  ohcyaeic  vnep  avra. 

1 Tac.  1.  c. : “ Nec  quisquam  defendere  audebat,  crebris  multorum  minis 
restinguere  prohibentium,  et  quia  alii  palam  faces  jaciebant  atque  sibi  auctorem 
VOL.  vi. — 9 


130 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  64. 


At  such  a moment  of  sorrow  and  consternation,  every 
trifle  is  seized  to  confirm  the  suspicion  of  foul  play.  The 
_ flames,  it  seems,  had  subsided  after  raging  for  six 

out  a second  days,  and  the  wretched  outcasts  were  beginning 
to  take  breath  and  visit  the  ruins  of  their  habita- 
tions, when  a second  conflagration  burst  out  in  a different 
quarter.  This  fire  commenced  at  the  point  where  the  iEmil- 
ian  gardens  of  Tigellinus  abutted  on  the  outskirts  of  the 
city  beneath  the  Pincian  hill ; and  it  was  on  Tigellinus  him- 
self, the  object  already  of  popular  scorn  if  not  of  anger,  that 
the  suspicion  now  fell.  The  wind,  it  seems,  had  now  chang- 
ed, for  the  fire  spread  from  the  north-west  towards  the  Qui- 
rinal  and  the  Viminal,  destroying  the  buildings,  more  sparsely 
planted,  of  the  quarter  denominated  the  Yia  Lata.  Three 
days  exhausted  the  fury  of  this  second  visitation,  in  which 
the  loss  of  life  and  property  was  less,  but  the  edifices  it  over- 
threw were  generally  of  greater  interest,  shrines  and  temples 
of  the  gods,  and  halls  and  porticos  devoted  to  the  amuse- 
ment or  convenience  of  the  people.  Altogether  the  disaster, 
whether  it  sprang  from  accident  or  design,  involved  nearly 
the  whole  of  Rome.  Of  the  fourteen  regions  of  the  city, 
three,  we  are  assured,  were  entirely  destroyed ; while  seven 
others  were  injured  more  or  less  severely:  four  only  of  the 
whole  number  escaped  unhurt.1  The  fire  made  a complete 

esse  vociferabantur,  sive  ut  raptas  licentius  exercerent  seu  jussu.  Pliny  {Hist, 
Nat  xvii.  1.),  Dion  (lxii.  17,  18.),  and  Suetonius  {Ner.  88.)  attribute  the  fire  to 
Nero’s  orders  without  hesitation,  a view  which  generally  recommended  itself 
to  the  ancients. 

1 The  three  quarters  which  are  said  to  have  been  destroyed  must  have  been 
the  Circus  Max.  (xi.),  the  Palatium  (x.),  and  Isis  and  Serapis  (in.).  I must 
question,  however,  the  entire  destruction  of  the  great  edifices  on  the  Palatine : 
the  temple  of  Apollo  is  mentioned  only  two  years  later  by  Suetonius  {Ner.  25.), 
and  the  Sibylline  oracles  kept  in  it  (comp.  Amm.  Marcell,  xxiii.  3.)  were  con- 
sulted immediately  afterwards.  The  destruction  of  the  Palatine  library  in  the 
fire  of  Commodus,  a hundred  and  fifty  years  later,  is  mentioned  by  Galenus 
{Be  Compos.  Medicam.  i.  1.).  Pliny  speaks,  however,  of  the  temple  of  the  Pa- 
latium, dedicated  to  Augustus  by  Livia,  as  consumed,  H.  N.  xii.  42.  The  seven 
quarters  partially  injured  appear  to  have  been,  first  the  Aventinus  (xin.),  Pis- 
cina Publica  (xii.),  Yia  Sacra  (iv.),  Caelimontana  (ii.),  and  Forum  Romanum 


A.U.  817.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


131 


clearance  of  the  central  quarters,  leaving,  perhaps,  but  few 
public  buildings  erect  even  on  the  Palatine  and  Aventine ; 
but  it  was,  for  the  most  part,  hemmed  in  by  the  crests  of  the 
surrounding  eminences,  and  confined  to  the  seething  crater 
which  had  been  the  cradle  of  the  Roman  people.  The  day 
of  its  outburst,  it  was  remarked,  was  that  of  the  first  burning 
of  Rome  by  the  Gauls,  and  some  curious  calculators  comput- 
ed that  the  addition  of  an  equal  number  of  years,  months, 
and  days  together,  would  give  the  complete  period  which 
had  elapsed  in  the  long  interval  of  her  greatness.1  Of  the 
number  of  houses  and  insulae  destroyed,  Tacitus  does  not 
venture  to  hazard  a statement ; he  only  tantalizes  us  by  his 
slendor  notice  of  the  famous  fanes  and  monuments  which 
sank  in  the  common  ruin.  Among  them  were  the  temple  of 
Diana,  which  Servius  Tullius  had  erected;  the  shrine  and 
altar  of  Hercules,  consecrated  by  Evander,  as  affirmed  in  the 

(tiii.)  ; yet  the  Capitoline  was  certainly  untouched,  and  there  is  no  reason  to 
believe  that  the  temples  and  basilicas  which  encompassed  the  forum  suffered. 
In  the  second  fire  the  Yia  Lata  (vii.)  and  a great  part  of  the  Circus  Flaminius 
(ix.)  were  devastated.  The  four  which  wholly  escaped  were  the  Transtiberina 
(xiv.),  the  Esquilina  (v.),  the  Alta  Semita  (vi.),  and  the  Porta  Capena  (i.).  See 
Bunsen’s  Bom.  L 191.  The  nine  days’  duration  is  proved,  not  from  the  his- 
torians (Tacitus  notes  only  the  six  days  of  the  first  fire),  but  by  an  inscription, 
Gruter,  61.  3.  (Hoeck.  p.  374.  note).  The  great  fire  of  London  lasted  only  four 
days,  and  swept  an  area  of  436  acres ; while  the  space  through  which  this 
conflagration  raged,  though  with  less  complete  destruction,  must  have  com- 
prised at  least  one  third  of  Rome,  or  not  less  than  three  times  that  extent. 
Comp.  Lambert’s  Hist,  of  London , ii.  91. 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  41. : “ Fuere  qui  adnotarent  xiv.  Kal.  Sext.  principium  in- 
cendii  hujus  ortum  quo  et  Senones  captam  Urbem  inflammaverant : alii  eo 
usque  curse  progress!  sunt  ut  totidem  annos  mensesque  et  dies  inter  utraque  in- 
cendia  numerent.”  The  interpreters  have  given  up  generally  the  attempt  to 
explain  this  obscure  passage ; but  the  principle  of  Grotefend’s  suggestion,  which 
I take  from  Ritter’s  note,  seems  peculiarly  happy.  Between  19  July,  364,  the 
received  date  of  the  Gaulish  fire,  and  19  July,  817,  are  exactly  453  years ; and 
the  addition  of  417  years,  417  months,  and  417  days,  completes  this  period 
wanting  about  40  days.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  we  suppose  these  calculators 
to  have  taken  363  for  the  date  of  the  Gaulish  fire,  the  interval  will  be  454 
years,  and  418  years  + 418  months  + 418  days  = 454  years  — 8 days 
only. 


132 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  64. 


tradition  impressed  upon  us  by  Virgil ; 1 the  Romulean  tem- 
ple of  Jupiter  Stator,  the  remembrance  of  which  thrilled  the 
soul  of  the  banished  Ovid ; 2 the  little  Regia  of  Numa,  which 
armed  so  many  a sarcasm  against  the  pride  of  consuls  and 
imperators ; the  sanctuary  of  Vesta  herself,  with  the  Palla- 
dium, the  Penates,  and  the  ever-glowing  hearth  of  the  Roman 
people.  But  the  loss  of  these  decayed,  though  venerable, 
objects  was  not  the  worst  disaster.  Many  an  unblemished 
masterpiece  of  the  Grecian  pencil,  or  chisel,  or  graver, — the 
prize  of  victory, — was  devoured  by  the  flames ; and  amidst 
all  the  splendour  with  which  Rome  rose  afterwards  from  her 
ashes,  old  men  could  lament  to  the  historian  the  irreparable 
sacrifice  of  these  ancient  glories.3  Writings  and  documents 
of  no  common  interest  may  have  perished  at  the  same  time 
irrecoverably ; and  with  them  trophies,  images,  and  family 
devices.  At  a moment  when  the  heads  of  patrician  houses 
were  falling  rapidly  by  the  sword,  the  loss  of  such  memorials 
was  the  more  deplorable ; and  from  this  epoch  we  may  date 
the  decay,  which  we  shall  soon  discover,  in  the  domestic  tra- 
ditions of  the  nobles. 

Nero  was  at  Antium,  nor  did  he  quit  that  favourite  resi- 
dence till  apprised  that  the  flames  had  reached  the  long  col- 
The  fire  im-  onnades  with  which  he  had  connected  the  man- 

popuiace  Se  sion  0n  Palatine  with  the  villa  of  Maecenas. 

Nero  himself.  woui<i  Seem  that  with  due  energy  the  progress 
of  the  fire  along  these  galleries  might  have  been  cut  off ; but 


1 Yirg.  JEn.  viii.  2*70. : 

“ Hanc  aram  luco  statuit,  quae  maxima  semper 
Dicetur  nobis,  et  erit  quae  maxima  semper.” 

2 Ovid.  Trist.  iii.  1-49. : 

“ Adjice  servatis  unum,  pater  optime,  civem  .... 

Me  miserum ! vereorque  locum,  venerorque  potentem.” 

3 Suet.  Ner.  38. : “ Domus  priscorum  ducum  hostilibus  adhuc  spoliis  ador- 

natae,  Deorumque  aedes,  . . . . et  quicquid  visendum  et  memorabile  ex 

antiquitate  duraverat.”  Tac.  1.  c. : “ Monumenta  ingeniorum  antiqua  et  incor- 
rupta : ” which  Lipsius  characteristically  interprets  of  the  autograph  writings 
of  the  ancients,  so  vainly  regretted  by  reviving  letters. 


A.U.  817.] 


TINDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


\ 133 


tlie  attempt  was  either  not  made,  or  made  too  late,  and  the 
flames,  it  is  said,  extended  to  the  palace,  and  involved  it,  or 
at  least  some  portion  of  it,  in  the  general  ruin.1  The  injury 
indeed  to  Nero’s  own  dwelling  was  greatly  exaggerated,  pos- 
sibly to  make  him  appear  to  have  suffered  equally  with  his 
people.  Altogether,  however,  the  disaster  was  the  greatest 
that  had  befallen  the  city,  since  the  era  of  the  Gaulish  inva- 
sion. The  mansions  of  the  nobles  were  scathed,  but  the  cab- 
ins of  the  populace  were  annihilated.  The  prince  was  pop- 
ularly held  responsible  for  every  public  calamity  ; and  when 
the  rumour,  not  improbable  in  itself,  was  circulated,  that 
Nero  had  watched  the  conflagration  from  the  towers  of  his 
villa,  and  chaunted  the  Sack  of  Troy  to  his  own  lyre,  the 
sufferers  were  prone  to  believe  that  he  had  commanded  the 
city  to  be  fired,  and  forbidden  the  flames  to  be  extinguished.3 
Once,  it  was  said,  when  the  line  before  quoted  by  Tiberius, 
After  my  death  perish  the  world  in  fire , was  recited  to  him ; 
Nay,  in  my  lifetime , had  been  his  fiendish  reply.  Another 
suspicion,  hardly  less  horrible,  prevailed,  that  he  had  caused 
the  destruction  of  the  ancient  city,  not  out  of  pure  wanton- 
ness, but  in  order  to  rebuild  it  more  magnificently,  and  dig- 
nify the  new  Rome  with  his  own  name.3  Accordingly,  what- 
ever favour  the  populace  had  hitherto  entertained  towards 

1 The  words  of  Tacitus  are  these  (c.  39.):  “Eo  in  tempore  Nero,  Antii 
agens,  non  ante  in  urbem  regressus  est  quam  domui  ejus , qua  palatium  et  Mm- 
cenatis  hortos  continuaverat,  ignis  propinquaret.  Neque  tamen  sisti  potuit  quin 
et  palatium  et  domus  et  cuncta  circum  haurirentur.”  I have  expressed  in  the 
text  the  qualification  I must  put  on  these  words.  There  must  have  been  a 
colonnade  or  gallery  across  the  Velia  to  connect  the  buildings  on  Hie  Palatine 
and  the  Esquiline,  probably  a viaduct,  like  the  bridge  of  Caius  across  the  Yela- 
brum,  with  carriage-way  underneath.  This  construction  was  possibly  of  wood. 
The  palace  on  the  Palatine  may  have  been  injured,  but  it  could  not  have  been 
destroyed  without  the  destruction  of  every  other  edifice  on  that  hill.  That  the 
other  portion  of  the  palace,  the  villa  of  Maecenas  on  the  Esquiline,  wholly  es- 
caped seems  certain  from  the  anecdote  which  follows. 

2 Suet.  Her.  38.:  “Hoc  incendium  ex  turre  Maecenatiana  prospectans,  lae- 
tusque  flammae  ut  aiebat  pulchritudine,  cl?mclv  Dii  in  illo  suo  scenico  habitu 
deeantavit.”  Comp.  Dion,  lxii.  29. ; Juvenal,  viii.  219. 

3 Suetonius,  a faithful  expounder  of  popular  traditions,  more  than  insinuates 


134 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  64. 


the  chief  who  flattered  and  amused  them,  they  were  now 
fiercely  exasperated.  It  was  to  little  purpose  that  he  provid- 
ed accommodation  for  the  shelter  of  the  houseless  multitudes 
and  supplied  with  anxious  care  their  most  pressing  necessi- 
ties,1 It  was  in  vain  that  the  gods  were  soothed  with  holo- 
causts, and  the  Sibyls’  books  consulted  for  expiations ; that 
vows  were  offered  to  Yulcan,  Ceres,  and  Proserpine,  and 
Juno  propitiated  by  processions  of  Roman  matrons.  The 
people  continued  to  mutter  their  dissatisfaction  with  increas- 
ing significance  ; it  was  necessary  to  divert  their  suspicions 
by  offering  them  another  victim;  and  Nero  seems  to  have 
saved  himself  at  last,  by  sacrificing  the  little  band  of  alien 
sectaries,  already  the  objects  of  their  hatred  and  reviling,  to 
whom  the  vulgar  gave  the  name  of  Christians .3 

This  name , says  Tacitus  in  a famous  passage  in  his  An- 
nals, was  derived  from  one  Christus , who  was  executed  in  the 
reign  of  Tiberius  by  the  procurator  of  Judea , Pontius  Pilate . 
This  accursed  superstition , for  a moment  repressed , spread 
again , not  over  Judea  only , the  source  of  this  evil , but  the 
City  also , whither  all  things  vile  and  shameful  find  room  and 
reception.  Accordingly , he  adds,  those  only  were  first  arrest- 
ed who  avowed  themselves  of  that  sect , afterwards  a vast 
number  discovered  by  them , who  were  convicted , not  so  much 
on  the  charge  of  burning , as  for  their  general  hatred  to  man- 
hind.  Their  execution  was  accompanied  with  mockery. 

this  charge:  “Quasi  offensus  deformitate  veterum  aedifieiorum,  et  angustiis 
flexurisque  vicorum,  incendit  urbem.”  Ner.  38. 

2 Tac.  1.  c. : “ Solatium  populo  exturbato  et  profugo  campum  Martis  et 
monumenta  Agrippae ; hortos  quin  etiam  suos  patefecit ; et  subitaria  aedificia 
exstruxit  quae  multitudinem  inopem  acciperent : subvectaque  utensilia  ab  Ostia 
et  propinquis  municipiis ; pretiumque  frumenti  minutum  usque  ad  ternos  num- 
mos.  Quae,  quanquam  popularia,  in  irritum  cadebant,  quia  pervaserat  rumor, 
ipso  tempore  flagrantis  urbis  inisse  eum  domesticam  scenam,  et  cecinisse  Tro- 
janum  excidium,  praesentia  mala  vetustis  cladibus  assimulantem.” 

3 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  44. : “ Ergo  abolendo  rumori  Nero  subdidit  reos  . . . 
quos  per  flagitia  invisos  vulgus  Christianos  appellabat.  Auctor  nominis  ejus 
Christus,”  &c.  I shall  enter  in  another  place  into  the  question,  who  were  the 
persons  to  whom  the  vulgar  applied  this  name  ? In  the  text  I confine  myself 
as  closely  as  possible  to  the  words  of  Tacitus. 


A.U.  817.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


135 


They  were  wrapped  in  sJcins  to  be  torn  in  pieces  by  dogs , or 
crucified , and  thus  set  on  fire  to  serve  as  torches  by  night . 
Nero  lent  his  own  gardens  for  the  spectacle , and  gave  a 
chariot  race  on  the  occasion , at  which  he  mingled  freely  with 
the  multitude  in  the  garb  of  a driver , or  actually  holding  the 
reins . The  populace,  however,  turned  with  their  usual  levity 
to  compassion  for  the  sufferers,  justly  odious  though  they 
were  held  to  be;  for  they  felt  that  it  was  not  for  their  actual 
guilt  nor  the  common  weal  that  they  were  punished,  but  to 
glut  the  ferocity  of  a single  tyrant .l 

This  horrid  sacrifice,  so  deeply  impressive  to  the  minds 
of  sixty  generations  of  Christians,  ruffled  then  for  a moment 
the  feelings  of  Roman  society,  and  excited  per-  The  rebuilding 
haps  in  the  heart  of  the  historian,  impassive  as  he  of  Eome- 
constrains  himself  to  appear,  more  pity,  more  wonder,  more 
reflection  at  least,  than  he  has  deigned  to  intimate.  But  a 
few  days  passed,  and  when  the  people  looked  again  around 
them,  they  beheld  the  reconstruction  of  their  smoking  city 
commencing  with  extraordinary  vigour.  The  decision  with 
which  the  plans  of  the  government  were  taken,  must  appear 
to  us  perfectly  amazing.  The  rebuilding  of  so  large  a portion 
of  the  largest  of  ancient  cities  on  a general  design,  including 
the  construction  of  a palace,  to  cover,  or  at  least  embrace 
with  all  its  adjuncts,  some  hundreds  of  acres,  was  carried  into 
execution  without  a moment’s  delay,  and  seems  to  have  been 

1 This  remarkable  and  often  cited  passage  has  several  difficulties.  I under- 
stand  the  “ odium  generis  humani  ” to  mean,  not  the  hatred  in  which  these 
sectaries  were  held,  but  rather  their  reputed  enmity  towards  all  others.  It  is 
a question  whether  the  confession  mentioned  was  of  the  burning  or  only  of  the 
Christian  belief : I suppose  the  latter : “ aut  flammandi  ” is  obscure  in  con- 
struction, but  the  sense  cannot  be  doubtful : “ sontes  ” may  apply  to  the  spe- 
cific charge,  meaning  that  the  people  really  believed  them  guilty  of  it,  or  it  may 
relate  to  the  crime  of  their  creed  generally.  The  gardens  referred  to  were  on 
the  slope  of  the  Vatican,  and  embraced,  it  is  supposed,  the  site  of  the  Place 
and  possibly  of  the  Church  of  St.  Peter’s.  The  obelisk  which  now  fronts  that 
church  stood  on  the  spina  of  Nero’s  Circus,  certainly  not  far  from  its  present 
position.  Mosheim  (Be  Reb.  Chr.  ante  Constant,  saec.  1.  § 34.)  fixes  the  be- 
ginning of  this  persecution  to  the  middle  of  the  November  of  this  year. 


136 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  64. 


effected  in  the  course  of  the  four  years  which  intervened  to 
the  death  of  Nero.1  The  city  of  the  plebs,  a collection  of  nar- 
row winding  lanes  which  crept  along,  the  hollows  at  the  foot 
of  the  seven  hills,  thronged  with  high  unsightly  masses  of 
brick  or  wood-work,  among  which  its  shifting  crowds  could 
with  difficulty  wind  their  way,  had  long  been  an  eyesore  to 
the  denizens  of  the  patrician  mansions  above,  constructed  in 
the  graceful  style  of  Greece,  their  level  lines  of  marble  ma- 
sonry flanked  with  airy  colonnades,  and  interspersed  with 
broad  courts  and  gardens.  This  combination,  indeed,  or 
contrast  of  the  ancient  and  the  modern,  the  grotesque  and  the 
elegant,  this  upper  growth  of  aristocratic  luxury  culminating 
above  the  smoky  hives  of  vulgar  industry,  must  have  given 
a character  to  the  whole  eminently  striking  and  picturesque. 
Rome  was  indeed  a double  city,  half  Greek  and  half  Italian. 
The  elements  of  change  long  operating  in  its  manners  were 
equally  active  in  its  external  development.  Grecian  forms 
were  steadily  encroaching  on  the  indigenous  features  of  its 
architecture.  To  reform,  to  improve,  had  been  in  fact  to 
copy  foreign,  and  to  displace  native,  models.  The  marble 
Rome  of  Augustus,  restorer  as  he  professed  himself,  was  a 
Grecian  mask  applied  to  a Roman  countenance.  Every  new 
temple  or  theatre,  bath  or  fountain,  added  another  Hellenic 
object  to  the  scene,  and  aided  in  this  gradual  disintegration. 
N ero  in  all  his  tastes  was  Grecian  or  Oriental ; yet  when  this 
grand  opportunity  offered  for  recasting  the  lower  city  on  the 
model  he  admired,  the  promptness  with  which  he  seized  it 
shows  that  he  followed  an  instinct  of  the  times,  and  not  a 
mere  caprice  of  his  own.  The  architects  were  ready  at  once 
with  their  plans  for  a total  reconstruction  after  the  fashion 
of  Athens  or  Antioch,  a style  more  familiar  to  their  schools 

1 The  conflagration  took  place  in  July,  817.  Nero’s  death  followed  in  June, 
821 ; but  it  would  appear  that  the  rebuilding  had  been  completed  before  that 
time ; certainly  the  palace  had  been  completed  much  earlier.  It  is  impossible 
not  to  suspect,  from  this  and  other  circumstances,  that  the  destruction  was  less 
extensive  than  has  been  represented.  The  temple  of  Apollo— apparently  that 
on  the  Palatine — is  mentioned  in  the  year  822  (Tac.  Hist.  iii.  65.). 


A.  U.  817.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


137 


than  the  obsolete  Italian.  After  the  fire  of  the  Gauls  Rome 
had  been  rebuilt  by  the  citizens  themselves,  each  man  for 
himself  from  his  own  notions  and  resources;  the  whole  re- 
sulting in  manifold  combinations  of  a few  simple  elements, 
the  wooden  shed,  the  broad  brick  wall,  the  narrow  windows, 
the  projecting  eaves,  the  pointed  gable.1  But  after  Nero’s 
fire  restoration  was  the  work  of  the  government : the  citizens, 
the  mass  at  least  of  the  lower  classes  who  still  dwelt  in  the 
valleys,  were  not  rich  enough  to  build  for  themselves,  even 
had  they  been  suffered  to  do  so : the  treasury  supplied  them 
with  money,  but  at  the  same  time  provided  them  with  de- 
signs : the  time  had  come  when  the  rulers  of  the  state  must 
execute  all  great  public  works  for  the  people,  and  employ  the 
services  of  a profession  to  which  architecture  of  a foreign 
type  was  alone  familiar.  The  character  indeed  of  the  site, 
and  the  necessity  of  lodging  vast  numbers  upon  small  areas, 
must  have  tended  to  modify  the  more  lax  and  spacious  feat- 
ures of  Hellenic  architecture : the  crowded  dwellings  of  the 
Suburra  and  Velabrum  could  not  have  been  less  than  fifty, 
sixty,  or  even  seventy  feet  in  height : but  the  substitution,  to 
a great  extent,  of  stone  for  brick  or  wood  in  the  basement  at 
least  of  these  edifices,  the  straightening  and  widening  of  the 
streets,  and  the  erection  of  open  colonnades  round  every 
block  of  houses,  was  the  application  of  a foreign  style,  which 
completely  changed  the  external  appearance  of  Rome.  On 
the  whole  the  system  of  Nero  and  his  architects  was  both 
salubrious  and  convenient,  though  many  citizens,  admirers 
of  all  things  old,  continued  to  lament  the  disappearance  of 
their  dark  and  tortuous  alleys,  and  to  allege,  with  some  justice 
perhaps,  that  the  narrowness  of  the  avenues  and  the  height  of 

1 The  fastigiata  and  pectinata  tecta  seem  to  imply  something  more  than 
the  Greek  pediment,  and  to  have  been  in  common  use  for  dwelling-houses,  not 
only  for  public  buildings.  There  is  perhaps  no  distinct  notice  of  gable  ends  to 
the  ordinary  Roman  roofs ; but  the  fact  that  the  earliest  temples  at  Rome  were 
thatched,  and  therefore  of  course  dwellings  also,  shows  that  the  roofs  must 
have  been  high-pitched. 


138 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  64. 


the  overhanging  edifices  had  afforded  a grateful  shade  in  sum- 
mer, and  protection  from  the  winds  in  winter.1 2 * * * * * 

But  Nero,  we  are  told,  took  advantage  of  the  void  which 
had  been  created  for  another  and  more  selfish  purpose.  He 

determined  to  extend  in  various  directions  the 

Extension  of  . 

Nero’s  palace  or  limits  of  his  own  residence,  and  to  cover  a large 

Golden  House.  . • , ° _ 

portion  of  the  area  of  Home  with  the  buildings  of 
the  Imperial  palace.  On  this  point,  however,  I am  constrain- 
ed to  be  sceptical.  We  have  already  seen  that  he  had  before 
connected  the  older  residence  of  the  Caesars,  enlarged  as  it 
had  been  by  successive  occupants,  on  the  Palatine,  with  the 
villa  of  Maecenas  on  the  Esquiline,  by  a series  of  galleries 
which  spanned,  perhaps,  the  hollow  between  those  hills  on 
arches,  so  as  to  allow  of  the  circulation  of  the  populace  in  the 
most  crowded  parts  of  the  city  below  it.  Such  seems  to  have 
been  the  character  of  the  Domus  Transitoria  or  House  of 
Passage,  which  fell,  as  we  have  seen,  a prey  to  the  flames.  I 
much  question,  however,  whether  either  of  the  edifices  which 
it  connected  had  suffered  very  severely,  and  the  Golden 
House,  as  the  restored  palace  was  denominated,  was  still  the 
old  mansion  of  Augustus  and  the  villa  of  Maecenas  connected 
a second  time  by  a long  series  of  columns  and  arches.  It  is 
probable,  indeed,  that  the  House  of  Passage  was  now  con- 
siderably enlarged,  and  made  to  embrace  a vast  extent  of 
gardens,  with  their  baths,  their  fishponds,  and  their  storied 
terraces.8  Nevertheless,  the  public  must  always  have  had 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  43. : “ Erant  tamen  qui  crederent  veterem  illam  formam 
salubritati  magis  conduxisse.”  Whatever  we  may  think  of  the  justice  of  this 
complaint,  it  may  be  worth  remarking,  as  a sign  of  the  difference  in  our  own 
ideas  and  the  Roman,  that  there  is  no  expression  of  regret  for  the  picturesque 
features  of  the  ancient  city  so  ruthlessly  sacrificed  to  the  taste  or  judgment  of 
the  day. 

2 This  house,  says  Tacitus,  was  not  so  remarkable  for  its  gold  and  precious 

stones,  as  for  the  gardens  it  embraced : “ arva  et  stagna,  et  in  modum  solitudi- 

num  hinc  sylvse,  inde  aperta  spatia  et  prospectus,”  c.  42.  The  taste  of  the 

Romans  in  gardening  required  geometrical  fines  of  gravel,  pavement,  box  bor- 

ders, and  shrubberies.  See  the  younger  Pliny’s  description  of  his  Tuscan 

villa  (Ep.  v.  6.),  and  some  of  the  frescoes  still  visible  on  the  walls  of  houses  in 


A.  U.  817.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


139 


means  of  communication  beneath  these  galleries,  or  through 
them,  from  the  forum  to  the  Cselian  hill,  and  to  the  Esquiline 
or  Capene  gates.  We  cannot  suppose  that  the  emperor’s 
stone  walls  intercepted  the  Sacred  and  the  Appian  Ways. 
These  colonnades,  such  as  I have  imagined  them,  were  three 
in  number ; each  of  them,  it  is  said,  a mile  in  length.  They 
reached,  it  may  be  presumed,  from  the  bridge  of  Caius  over 
the  Velabrum,  which  was  perhaps  destroyed  by  the  fire,  and 
never,  as  far  as  we  know,  rebuilt,  almost  to  the  site  of  S. 
Maria  Maggiore  on  the  Esquiline,  and  of  S.  Gregorio  on  the 
Cselian,  and  these  were  again  connected  perhaps  by  a third.1 
The  area  now  filled  with  the  Colosseum  was  embraced  within 
their  ample  circuit,  and  this  spot  was  occupied  by  a basin  of 
water.2  It  is  a pardonable  extravagance  in  Pliny  to  declare 
that  the  city  was  encompassed  by  the  palace  of  Nero;  but 
this  expression,  which  he  has  applied  also  to  the  far  less  ex- 
tensive encroachments  of  Caius,  seems  to  show  that  even 
within  the  circuit  of  its  ample  arcades  many  houses,  streets, 

Pompeii.  Matius,  the  friend  of  Caesar,  invented  the  art  of  cutting  yews,  box, 
and  Cyprus  into  figures  of  men  and  animals  (Plin.  H.  N.  xii.  6.),  and  this  gro- 
tesque practice  survived  to  the  time  of  Pliny  and  Martial  (Mart.  iii.  58.,  xii.  50.). 
Nero,  I presume,  ventured  to  discard  this  formality,  and  his  attempt  to  restore 
some  natural  features  to  a garden  landscape  offended  the  admirers  of  antiquity. 
This  was  the  “ rure  vero  barbaroque  lsetari  ” of  Martial.  I refer  to  Prof.  Dau- 
beny’s  Lectures  on  Roman  Husbandry , vii.,  for  these  and  further  details  of  the 
subject  of  Roman  gardening. 

1 Martial  (de  Sped.  2.)  defines  the  limits  of  this  palace  in  two  directions  by 
the  baths  of  Titus  on  the  Esquiline,  and  the  portico  of  Claudius,  connected,  it 
may  be  presumed,  with  his  unfinished  temple  on  the  Caelian : 

“ Claudia  diflusas  ubi  porticus  explicat  umbras, 

Ultima  pars  aulae  deficientis  erat.” 

It  has  been  mentioned  that  Nero  is  said  to  have  destroyed  the  works  of  the 
Claudian  temple : this,  if  not  a misrepresentation,  was  probably  to  make  room 
for  his  own  constructions. 

2 Martial,  1.  c. : 

“ Hie  ubi  conspicui  venerabilis  amphitheatri 
Erigitur  species,  stagna  Neronis  erant.” 

Comp.  Suet.  Her.  31. : “ Stagnum  maris  instar,  circumseptum  aedificiis  ad  ur- 
bium  speciem : rura  insuper,  arvis  atque  vinetis,  et  pascuis  silvisque  varia.” 


140 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  64. 


and  places  were  surrendered  to  the  occupation  of  the  citizens. 
We  should  still  less  expect  strict  accuracy  in  the  statements 
of  a pasquinade,  which  has  been  preserved  to  ns  by  Suetonius. 
Insinuating  a direct  comparison  between  the  conflagration  of 
the  Gauls  and  of  Nero,  Rome , it  said,  will  be  reduced  to  a 
single  house  : migrate , 0 Romans , to  Veii,  like  your  ancestors 
before  you  ; if  Veii  indeed  itself  be  not  embraced  also  by  that 
single  house?  But  the  epithet  of  Golden,  which  this  palace 
obtained,  was  derived  from  the  splendour  of  its  decorations. 
Externally  it  was  adorned  with  all  the  luxury  of  art  and 
taste  at  their  highest  eminence,  with  gilded  roofs  and  sculp- 
tured friezes,  and  panels  of  many-coloured  marble.  Within, 
it  was  a rich  museum  of  painting,  precious  stones,  and  stat- 
uary : amidst  the  rubbish  of  its  long-ruined  chambers  some  of 
the  choicest  works  of  ancient  art  have  been  discovered,  and 
the  modern  frescoes  which  we  most  admire  seem  to  have  been 
copied  by  stolen  glimpses  from  walls  unveiled  for  a moment 
and  again  shrouded  in  darkness.1 2 3  The  grand  entrance  from 
the  forum  and  the  Sacred  Way  was  adorned  with  a marble 
statue  of  the  emperor  120  feet  in  height,  the  colossus  which 
afterwards  gave  its  name  to  the  amphitheatre  of  V espasian. 
When  Nero  at  last  took  possession  of  this  gorgeous  habita- 
tion, he  remarked  complacently  that  now  he  was  lodged  as  a 
man  should  be? 

1 Suet.  Ner.  39. : 

“ Roma  domus  fiet : Yeios  migrate  Quirites ; 

Si  non  et  Yeios  occupet  una  domus.” 

2 Suet.  Ner.  31. : “ In  caeteris  partibus  cuncta  auro  lita,  distincta  gem  mis 
unionumque  conchis  erant.  Coenationes  laqueatae  tabulls  ebumeis  versatili- 
bus,”  &c.  The  baths  of  Titus  were  afterwards  erected  on  a part  of  this  palace 
on  the  Esquiline,  and  stand  on  its  lower  chambers,  within  which  the  great  vase 
of  the  Yatican  and  other  monuments  of  art  have  been  discovered.  The  Lao- 
coon  was  found  sim'larly  imbedded  at  no  great  distance.  How  such  works 
came  to  be  there  left  amidst  the  rubbish  seems  inexplicable.  It  is  believed 
that  Raphael  took  the  designs  of  some  of  his  arabesques  from  paintings  re- 
vealed in  these  chambers,  which  he  purposely  caused  to  be  filled  up  again, 
to  conceal  the  plagiarism. 

3 Martial,  i.  2.  Suet.  1.  c. : “ Se  quasi  hominem  jam  habitare  ccepisse.” 


A.  U.  817.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


141 


These  vast  constructions  were  planned  and  executed  by 
the  architects  Severus  and  Celer,  both  of  them,  it  may  be  re- 
marked, not  of  Greek  but  of  Roman  origin.  Exactions  and 
These  men  seem  to  have  been  bold  designers  as  Jequ^edtTde- 
well  as  able  builders ; their  profession  combined  {JnsfoAhese 
engineering  with  architecture.  They  had  great  constructions, 
influence  with  their  master,  and  seem  to  have  inspired  him 
with  many  grand  conceptions,  the  exact  purport  of  which 
may  have  been  inadequately  represented  to  us.  The  naviga- 
ble canal  which  they  projected,  from  the  lake  of  Avemus  and 
the  Julian  haven  to  Rome,  was  evidently  not  a mere  freak 
of  power,  but  a work  of  utility  for  the  transport  of  grain  to 
the  city.1  The  attempt,  made  in  earnest,  was  probably  aban- 
doned from  caprice.  The  rebuilding  of  Rome  in  the  course 
of  four  years  tasked  all  the  energies  of  the  artisans  of  Italy. 
But  the  expense  of  these  extraordinary  efforts  caused  on  the 
whole  more  dangerous  discontent  than  the  worst  caprices  of 
tyranny;  and  unless  we  suppose  Nero  devoid  of  the  most 
ordinary  foresight,  we  must  allow  that  he  would  hardly  have 
caused  a conflagration,  which  could  not  fail  to  entangle  him 
in  fatal  embarrassments.  He  was  compelled  to  strain  the 
patience  of  his  subjects  by  increased  exactions.  An  organiz- 
ed system  of  plunder  was  now  extended  throughout  the  em- 
pire, which  ruined  the  citizens,  the  allies,  and  the  free  com- 
munities. Nero  began  by  requiring  contributions,  under  the 
name  of  free  gifts  ; and  neglect  in  responding  to  this  invita- 
tion was  visited  by  heavier  imposts.  Treasures,  human  and 
divine,  were  swept  into  the  gulf.  The  temples  of  Rome  it- 
self were  denuded  of  the  offerings  of  ages,  the  spoil  of  con- 

1 Nero  is  said  also  to  have  designed  extending  Rome  to  Ostia.  Suetonius 
says  of  his  buildings,  “Non  in  alia  re  damnosior  quam  in  sedificando.”  The 
magnificence  of  his  baths  continued  to  be  celebrated  long  after  him.  Martial 
says  of  them,  “ Quid  Nerone  pejus  ? Quid  thermis  melius  Neronianis  ? ” The 
Church  of  S.  Louis,  on  the  Pincian,  is  supposed  to  stand  upon  them.  Ampere, 
Hist.  Romaine  d Rome , § 3.  In  the  year  817  Nero  erected  himself  also  a tri- 
umphal arch  on  the  Capitoline,  to  celebrate  his  pretended  successes  against  the 
Parthians.  To  occupy  that  sacred  site  with  a monument  of  personal  vanity 
was  an  act  of  unprecedented  ostentation.  Tac.  Ann.  xv.  18. 


142 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  64. 


quered  enemies  long  hoarded  in  the  shrines  of  the  gods,  the 
trophies  of  victories  and  triumphs  held  sacred  through  all 
emergencies,  which  even  Caesar,  who  sacked  the  treasury,  had 
reluctantly  respected.1 2 3  From  Greece  and  Asia  not  the  offer- 
ings only,  but  the  images  of  the  gods  themselves,  were  car- 
ried olf  by  authorized  commissioners.*  Of  these  Acratus  was 
a freedman  of  the  palace,  who  retained  as  a courtier  the  spirit 
of  a slave ; 8 Carrinas  Secundus,  a freeborn  Roman,  once  a 
teacher  of  rhetoric,  who  had  starved  at  Athens  in  the  prac- 
tice of  his  profession,  acquired  notoriety  at  Rome,  and  suffer- 
ed banishment  as  a declaimer  on  tyrannicide,  now  finished 
his  career  as  an  unscrupulous  agent  of  tyranny.4 *  Seneca,  as 
a man  of  sense  and  honour,  was  shocked  at  these  outrages  on 
the  national  feeling  of  the  Greeks,  and  distressed  lest  they 
should  be  ascribed  to  his  counsels.  Once  more  he  begged 
leave  to  retire  into  privacy.  Again  disappointed,  he  affected 
sickness,  and  confined  himself  strictly  to  his  chamber.  Some 
averred  that  his  life  was  now  attempted  by  poison  at  Nero’s 
instigation ; that  he  escaped  either  by  the  confession  of  the 
person  employed,  or  by  his  own  care  in  abstaining  from  all 
suspicious  viands,  and  tasting  nothing  but  plain  fruits  and 
vegetables,  bread  and  water.  Insults  such  as  these  to  the 
faith  and  feelings  of  the  people  were  accompanied,  no  doubt, 
by  cruel  extortions  and  the  confiscation  of  private  possessions ; 
and  Nero,  emboldened  by  the  incredible  submission  of  the 
world  to  his  feeble  sceptre,  treated  gods  and  men  alike  as 
mere  slaves  of  his  will,  ordained  equally,  whether  in  earth  or 
heaven,  for  his  personal  service  and  gratification.  Neverthe- 

1 Tacitus,  xv.  45. 

2 Pausanias  refers  to  the  spoliation  of  the  Grecian  temples  by  Nero : v.  25, 
26.,  ix.  27.,  x.  7.  From  Delphi  he  carried  off  no  less  than  five  hundred  brazen 
statues.  Caius  had  robbed  the  Thespians  of  a Cupid  by  Praxiteles,  which 
Claudius  restored  them.  Nero  seized  it  a second  time.  Comp.  Dion  Chrys. 
Or.  Rhod.  p.  355.  Plin.  Hist.  Nat.  xxxiv.  19. 

3 Tac.  1.  c. ; Dion  Chrys.  1.  c. : tore  yap  "Atcparoc  kneivog  ttjv  olKOvpbrjv 
(j^edov  aTracav  rrepteWuv  tovtov  x^pw. 

4 For  Carrinas  see  Dion,  lix.  20.,  and  compare  Juvenal,  vii.  204.,  alluding, 

as  is  generally  supposed,  to  the  same  person. 


A.  U.  817.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


143 


less  the  calamities  with  which  this  year  closed  must  have 
struck  him  with  alarm  in  the  midst  of  his  frantic  ^ ^ 
caprices.  An  outbreak  of  gladiators  at  Prseneste  portents  and 
was  speedily  suppressed ; but  it  reminded  men 
of  the  attempt  of  Spartacus,  and  the  ancient  troubles  of  the 
republic,  and  betrayed  the  fact  that  the  prospect  of  revolu- 
tion was  contemplated  with  hope  no  less  than  with  appre- 
hension. The  loss  of  some  galleys  on  the  Campanian  coast, 
through  a thoughtless  command  of  the  emperor’s  which  their 
captains  dared  not  disobey,  might  impress  the  singer  of  the 
Sack  of  Ilium  with  Minerva’s  vengeance  on  an  older  sacri- 
lege ; 1 while  the  occurrence  of  fearful  prodigies,  of  monstrous 
births,  of  storms  and  meteors,  above  all,  the  blazing  of  a 
comet,  extorted  from  the  soothsayers  the  prophecy  of  a new 
rebellion,  though  they  ventured  to  promise  that  it  should  be 
instantly  quelled.2 

This  apprehension  of  impending  change  was,  indeed,  no 
groundless  presentiment.  Nero’s  crimes  and  follies  had  been 

1 Virg.  AEn.  xi.  260. : 

“ Scit  triste  Minerv® 

Sidus,  et  Euboic®  cautes,  ultorque  Caphareus.” 

Tac.  Ann.  xv.  46. : “ Clades  rei  navalis,  non  bello,  quippe  haud  alias  tam  im- 
mota  pax.”  Comp,  the  fragment  of  Turnus,  Wernsdorf,  Poet.  lat.  Min.  iii. : 
“ Et  molle  imperii  senium  sub  nomine  paeis.” 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  47. : “ Sidus  cometes,  semper  illustri  sanguine  Neroni  ex- 
piaturn.”  Seneca’s  allusion  to  this  comet  is  curious,  if  he  was  conscious  of 
the  conspiracy  at  that  moment  in  agitation.  Nat.  Qucest.  vii.  17. : “ Qui  sub 
Nerone  apparuit  et  cometis  detraxit  infamiam.”  Virgil  speaks  generally  of  the 
evil  influence  of  comets : “ Comet®  Sanguinei  lugubre  rubent.”  uEn.  x.  272. 
The  instinct  of  a later  generation  made  them  always  presage  evil  to  tyrants. 
Lucan,  i.  628.:  “Terris  mutantem  regna  cometen.”  Stat.  Theb.  i.  fin.:  “Mu- 
tent  qu®  sceptra  comet®.”  Sil.  i.  460. : “ Terret  fera  regna  cometes.”  And 
so  our  republican  Milton : “ Which  with  fear  of  change  Perplexes  monarchs.” 
To  the  portent  of  the  comet,  Tacitus  adds : “ Bicipites  hominum  partus  .... 
natus  vitulus  cui  caput  in  crure  esset.”  The  double  head  presaged  unnatural 
rivalry.  Comp.  Lucan,  i.  626  : 

“ Quodque,  nefas,  nullis  impune  apparuit  extis, 

Ecce ! videt  capiti  fibrarum  increscere  molem 
Alterius  capitis.” 


144 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  64. 


long  threatened  with  retribution ; and  the  murmurs  of  the 
injured  had  deepened  into  a fixed  discontent,  which  official 
seers  might  represent  as  a token  of  an  occult  conspiracy. 

Amonor  the  nobles  there  were  many  who  com- 

Growing  dis-  . ® _ , . _ _ J ... 

content  of  the  plained  oi  personal  insults,  many  whose  ambition, 
whether  criminal  or  honest,  had  met  with  unex- 
pected rebuffs,  many,  no  doubt,  who  had  suffered  wanton 
oppression ; others  who  resented  the  degradation  of  the  re- 
public ; lastly,  tnere  were  some  who  watched  their  discon- 
tent from  a distance,  awaiting  the  moment  when  they  might 
turn  it  to  their  own  aggrandisement.  It  was  necessary  to 
fix  on  some  personage  around  whom  the  discontented  could 
rally,  and  whom  they  could  agree  to  substitute  for  Nero. 
There  was  no  idea,  in  any  quarter,  of  returning  to  the  an- 
cient free  state.  The  pride  of  independence  and  mutual  equal- 
ity, once  so  strong  in  the  Roman  aristocracy,  had  collapsed 
for  ever ; to  the  mass  of  the  people  it  had  never  been  known. 
The  necessity  of  monarchy  was  indeed  enforced  by  practical 
considerations.  No  conspiracy  could  hope  for  success  with- 
out the  support  of  the  soldiers ; the  soldiers  would  not  draw 
their  swords  for  a political  abstraction ; and  any  leader  to 
whom  they  gave  their  allegiance,  must  have  Rome  and  the 
empire  at  his  feet.  If,  however,  they  could  not  escape  from 
subjection  to  a single  ruler,  the  nobles  were  anxious  to  have 
an  easy  and  quiet  man,  who  would  interfere  little  with  them, 
and  even  pretend  to  put  himself  under  their  protection. 
Among  the  great  families  already  scathed  by  proscriptions, 
there  was  at  this  time  but  one  peculiarly  eminent  which  was 
not  connected  with  the  hated  house  of  the  Claudii  and  the 
Julii.  The  Pisos  had  long  borne  themselves  as  rivals  of  the 
emperors : a Cnaeus  Piso,  as  we  have  seen,  had  fancied  him- 
self the  equal  of  Tiberius ; and  the  pride  with  which  an- 
other had  threatened  to  withdraw  from  public  life,  showed 
that  he  could  not  brook  to  act  as  a subordinate.  Even  after 
the  death  of  Cnseus,  and  the  disgrace  of  his  house,  his  sons 
and  grandsons  had  continued  to  hold  their  rank  among  the 
Roman  nobility.  One  of  the  first  caprices  of  Caligula  was  his 


A.  U.  817.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


145 


attempt  to  degrade  the  head  of  the  Calpumii,  by  taking  from 
him  his  wife,  and  afterwards  by  banishing  him.1  But  this 
man,  C.  Calpumius  Piso,  was  restored  to  favour  ^y  form  a 
by  Claudius,  in  compliment  to  the  senate  ; he  was  piacTSsTauts 
moreover  elevated  to  the  consulship.  The  elo-  bead* 
quence  of  the  * speech  with  which  he  repaid  this  indulgence 
has  been  especially  commemorated  in  the  verses  of  a client 
or  parasite.2  His  abilities,  his  riches,  his  liberality  are  all 
equally  extolled  by  the  same  panegyrist ; but  they  are  suffi- 
ciently confirmed  by  the  sincerer  testimony  of  an  historian 
and  a satirist.3  Piso,  however,  was  not  a man  of  action,  and 
in  the  absence  of  higher  aims  in  life  he  became  celebrated  for 
his  skill  in  the  mock  campaigns  of  chess  or  draughts.  His 
mild  temper  was  not  agitated,  perhaps,  by  the  illusions  of 
political  ambition ; but  he  disdained  to  yield  precedence  to 
any  other,  and  held  aloof,  as  far  as  possible,  from  public  life 
till  tempted  in  an  unwary  moment  with  the  offer  of  pre-emi- 
nence. 

Around  this  central  figure,  itself  of  no  great  mark  or 
hopefulness,  were  soon  grouped  a number  of  lesser  men, 
senators,  knights,  and  military  officers,  intent 

. . J ’ . The  conspira- 

upon  transferring  the  empire  to  him  from  the  tors,  and  their 
last  descendant  of  the  Julii.  Women  were  also  assassination 
admitted  to  the  conspiracy.  Fenius  Rufus,  the  ° e emperor' 
colleague  of  Tigellinus  in  command  of  the  praetorians,  was  im- 
pelled to  join  it  by  hatred  towards  the  rival  who  had  eclipsed 
him  in  his  chief’s  regards.  His  position,  if  not  his  personal 
qualities,  gave  him  the  foremost  place  in  the  whole  band. 
Another  of  the  conspirators,  a man  of  more  vehemence  than 

1 C.  Calpumius  Piso  was  banished  for  taking  back  his  wife,  after  the  em- 
peror had  dismissed  her.  Caligula  had  probably  a political  motive  in  this  out- 
rageous tyranny.  He  wanted  to  bring  the  rival  family  to  an  end. 

2 See  the  Carmen  ad  Pison.  68.  This  poem  is  ascribed  by  Wemsdorf  to 
Saleius  Bassus,  the  “ tenuis  Saleius  ” of  Juvenal : it  is  certainly  not  Lucan’s. 

3 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  48.  Juvenal,  v.  108. : “ Quae  Piso  bonus,  quae  Cotta  sole- 
bat  Largiri.”  The  scholiast  on  this  passage  confirms,  with  some  additions,  the 
account  of  Suetonius,  Calig.  25.  He  mentions  also  Piso’s  fame,  “ in  ludo  la- 
trunculorum,”  by  which  he  is  identified  with  the  subject  of  the  panegyric. 

VOL.  vi. — 10 


146 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  65. 


vigour,  was  the  youthful  poet  M.  Annaeus  Lucanus,  who,  in 
the  better  years  of  Nero’s  career,  had  been  his  associate  and 
a rival  in  versification,  and  is  supposed  to  have  suffered 
slights  from  the  imperial  jealousy.1  Dion  has  specified 
Seneca,  Lucan’s  uncle,  as  also  an  accomplice.2  The  tribune 
of  a praetorian  cohort,  named  Subrius  Flavus,  claimed  the 
honour  of  assassinating  the  emperor  with  his  own  hand.  He 
proposed  to  attack  him  openly  while  singing  on  the  stage, 
and  again,  in  the  confusion  of  the  conflagration  of  Rome,  to 
waylay  him  among  the  passages  of  his  burning  palace.3  He 
seems,  however,  to  have  been  a man  of  no  real  determination, 
and  to  have  shrunk  in  either  case  from  the  personal  hazard. 
It  was  next  proposed  to  strike  the  blow  when  the  emperor 
was  at  a private  villa  of  Piso’s : again  Piso  refused  to  violate 
the  laws  of  hospitality,  a piece  of  sentiment  which  in  such  a 
matter  can  hardly  command  our  respect.  Some  indeed  sur- 
mised that  in  fact  he  feared  to  leave  the  capital  open  to  a 
possible  rival,  or  even  to  the  senate  and  the  partisans,  if  such 
there  were,  of  a republic.4  But  indecision  reigned  on  all  sides 
among  the  conspirators.  Their  behaviour  was  as  frivolous  as 

1 The  statement  in  the  anonymous  life  of  Lucan  (ex  comment,  antiquissimo), 
that  he  gained  the  prize  from  the  emperor  at  the  Quinquennia,  is  contrary  to 
the  text  of  the  genuine  biography  of  Nero.  See  Suet.  Ner.  12,  21.  The  short 
fragment  upon  Lucan  ascribed  to  Suetonius  affirms,  with  more  probability,  that 
he  provoked  his  patron  by  some  indiscretions,  and,  having  lost  his  favour,  pro- 
ceeded first  to  libel  and  afterwards  to  conspire  against  him.  But  that  Nero 
was  jealous  of  his  talent  and  forbade  him  to  exhibit  in  public,  is  distinctly  as- 
serted by  Tacitus,  Ann.  xv.  49. : “ Lucanum  propriae  causae  ascendebant  quod 
famam  carminum  ejus  premebat  Nero,  prohibueratque  ostentare  vanus  assimi- 
latione.” 

2 Dion,  lxii.  24.  If  not  actually  engaged  in  the  plot  we  may  infer,  I think, 
from  Tacitus  that  he  was  aware  of  it.  The  sentiment  ascribed  to  him  by  Dion, 
that  the  assassination  was  necessary  to  free  Rome  from  Nero  and  to  free  Nero 
from  himself  savours  of  Seneca’s  rhetoric. 

3 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  50.  This  statement,  dropped  negligently  by  the  historian, 
shows,  if  true,  that  the  conspiracy  had  been  long  in  agitation. 

4 The  apprehended  rival  was  L.  Junius  Torquatus  Silanus,  the  son  of  M. 
Silanus  (pecus  aurea)  cons.  a.  d.  46,  poisoned  by  Agrippina.  See  above,  c.  lii. 
Lucius  was  atnepos,  or  great-great-great-grandson,  of  Augustus. 


A.  U.  818.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


147 


the  motives  generally  attributed  to  them  were  personal  and 
selfish.  One  indeed  among  them  a freedwoman  named  Epi- 
charis  (but  why  a woman  among  them  at  all  ? why  a Grecian 
freedwoman  ?)  seems  to  have  acted  with  more  sense  and  spirit 
than  any  of  the  men.  Not  only  did  she  embrace  their  plans 
with  ardour,  and  nerve  their  courage  to  the  utmost,  but 
while  they  were  concerting  imprudent  schemes,  and  again 
lightly  relinquishing  them,  she  alone  undertook  to  gain  the 
fleet  at  Misenum,  which  protected  the  corn  fleets  of  Alexan- 
dria, and  held  the  existence  of  Rome  in  its  hands.  Possibly 
she,  too,  was  more  energetic  than  discreet.  Her  secret  was 
betrayed  by  an  officer  named  Volusius,  whom  she  had  en- 
gaged in  the  scheme;  but  she  alone  was  arrested.  The 
names  of  her  confederates  she  had  concealed  from  her  be- 
trayer, and  while  she  was  still  retained  in  custody,  and  fruit- 
lessly interrogated,  the  conspirators,  trusting  to  her  forti- 
tude and  fidelity,  continued  to  meet  and  deliberate.  At  last 
they  fixed  the  nineteenth  of  April,  the  day  of  the  Circensian 
games,  for  executing  their  enterprise.  A senator  named 
Scaevinus  demanded  the  honour  of  striking  the  blow,  and  for 
this  purpose  abstracted  a votive  dagger  from  a temple  of 
Salus  or  of  Fortune.1  It  was  arranged  that  he  should  make 
the  attack  with  the  support  of  a chosen  party  in  the  senate, 
while  Plautius  Lateranus  was  prostrating  himself  before  the 

1 I would  willingly  conjecture  that  there  was  some  connexion  between  this 
Scaevinus  and  the  Scaeva  whom  Lucan  so  delights  to  honour : Comp.  Phars. 
vi.  256. : 

“ Exomantque  Deos  ac  nudum  pectore  Martem 
Armis  Scaeva  tuis  : felix  hoc  nomine  famae,”  &c. 

The  last  lines  the  poet  penned  contain  a thrilling  reminiscence  of  this  true  Ro- 
man hero,  Caesarean  though  he  was  : 

“ Scaevam  perpetuae  meritum  jam  nomina  famae 
Ad  campos,  Epidamne,  tuos,  ubi  solus  apertis 
Obsedit  muris  calcantem  moenia  Magnum.”  x.  extr. 

We  might  imagine  him  only  holding  his  hand,  till  Scaevinus  should  strike  down 
the  last  of  the  Julii,  to  complete  the  passage  with  a sentiment  like  that  of  the 
verse  I have  before  quoted : 

“ Yivat,  et  ut  Bruti  procumbat  victima,  regnet.” 


148 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  65. 


emperor,  and  clinging  to  his  limbs  or  throwing  him  down. 
Piso  himself  was  to  await  the  result  in  the  adjacent  temple 
of  Ceres,  whence  Fenius  was  to  fetch  him  to  the  camp,  and 
present  him,  together  with  Antonia,  the  daughter  of  Claudius, 
to  the  soldiers.  It  was  still  deemed  expedient  to  conciliate 
the  soldiery  by  the  presence  of  a representative  of  German- 
icus.  Such,  at  least,  was  the  account  given  by  Pliny,  though 
Tacitus  hesitates  to  believe  it,  from  the  known  attachment 
of  Piso  to  his  wife,  and  the  improbability  of  Antonia  embrac- 
ing a scheme  from  which,  except  by  marriage  with  Piso,  she 
could  reap  no  personal  advantage.1  There  seems,  however, 
little  force  in  the  objection,  while  in  the  abiding  sense  it  im- 
plies of  military  devotion  there  is  something  both  natural  and 
touching. 

And  here  the  historian  remarks  on  the  fidelity  with  which 
the  secret  was  kept  among  confederates  of  different  rank,  age, 
Conviction  and  an(^  sex*  The  plot  seems  to  have  been  in  agita- 
the  conspi^f-  tion  f°r  nearly  a year,  and  even  the  indiscretion 
tors-  of  Epicharis,  if  we  may  believe  our  accounts, 

seems  not  to  have  materially  endangered  it.  But  the  bold 
and  eager  Scsevinus  at  last  unwittingly  betrayed  it.  The 
day  before  the  attempt  was  to  be  made,  after  holding  a long 
conversation  with  one  of  the  party,  he  was  observed  to  seal 
his  will,  then  taking  his  dagger  from  its  sheath,  and  trying  its 
edge,  he  gave  it  to  a freedman,  named  Milichus,  to  sharpen.  He 
then  lay  down  to  a supper  of  more  than  usual  profusion,  and 
gave  freedom  to  the  most  esteemed  of  his  slaves.  At  the  same 
time  his  manner  was  that  of  a man  labouring  under  anxiety, 
which  he  tried  in  vain  to  disguise  by  the  assumption  of  ex- 
cessive hilarity.  Finally  he  charged  Milichus  to  prepare 
bandages  and  fomentations  for  the  cure  of  wounds.  These 
circumstances  awakened  suspicion,  if  indeed  Milichus  was  not 
actually  admitted  to  the  secret.  At  all  events  the  wretch, 
whose  servile  nature  had  not  been  eradicated  by  freedom,  was 
tempted  to  reveal  his  suspicions  by  hopes  of  a splendid  re- 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  53. 


A.  U.  818.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


149 


ward.1  The  first  of  the  conspirators  who  were  arrested  at 
his  indication,  and  threatened  with  the  question,  made  ample 
disclosures.  Hopes  of  pardon  induced  them  to  denounce  one 
another,  together  with  some  perhaps  who  were  innocent ; and 
Lucan,  in  particular,  is  charged  with  thus  revealing  the  name 
of  his  own  mother.  Such  charges,  it  must  be  remembered, 
are  commonly  made  by  unscrupulous  governments  to  dis- 
grace a commiserated  victim.  But  the  sufferings  of  a freed- 
woman  would  excite  little  sympathy,  and  Epi-  constancy  of 
charis  alone,  it  was  admitted,  from  the  weakness  EPlcharis- 
of  whose  sex  greater  infirmity  might  be  expected,  refused  to 
betray  the  men  who  had  trusted  her.  When,  after  being 
lacerated  on  the  rack,  she  was  brought  a second  time  before 
her  judges,  bound  to  the  chair,  in  which  she  could  not  sit  un- 
supported, she  contrived  to  strangle  herself  with  the  thongs, 
and  died  without  a confession.  Of  all  the  con-  Treachery  of 
spirators,  Fenius  Rufus  was  the  one  whose  fate  Fenms  Eufas- 
deserved  the  least  pity.  As  prefect  of  the  guards,  he  con- 
trived adroitly  to  place  himself  on  the  tribunal  by  the  side 
of  Tigellinus,  and  sought  to  screen  himself  from  inquiry  by 
the  violence  with  which  he  judged  his  own  associates.  De- 
nounced at  last  by  one  of  the  victims,  he  turned  pale,  stam- 
mered, and  was  unable  to  defend  himself.2  The  accused  were 
speedily  convicted.  Doomed  without  mercy  by  this  domes- 
tic inquisition,  they  were  allowed  only  to  choose  their  mode 
of  death,  an  indulgence  which  spared  the  government  the 
odium  of  a public  sentence.  When  escape  was  impossible, 
the  culprits  suffered  with  the  callous  fortitude  which  had  be- 
come habitual  with  their  class  under  the  terrors  of  the  im- 
perial tyranny.  If  they  deigned  to  flatter  the 

. . , ; . , J „ , Death  of  Lucan. 

prmce  with  their  last  breath,  it  was  for  the  sake 
of  their  children.  Lucan  died  with  a firmness  which,  while 
he  still  hoped  for  pardon,  is  said  to  have  failed  him ; and, 
when  his  veins  were  opened  in  the  bath,  found  consolation  in 
reciting  some  of  his  own  verses,  descriptive  of  a monstrous 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xvl  56,  57. 


2 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  66. 


150 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  65. 


death  by  bleeding  at  every  pore.1 2  Perhaps  his  conscience 
would  not  suffer  him  to  utter  at  such  a moment  those  denun- 
ciations of  a tyranny  he  had  so  often  flattered,  or  that  praise 
of  constancy  he  had  failed  to  exhibit,  with  which  so  much  of 
his  poetry  glows.  /Swords,  he  had  once  exclaimed,  were  given 
men  that  they  might  never  be  slaves.  Again,  he  is  happiest 
who  is  content  to  die , next  happiest  he  who  is  compelled 
Among  the  first  on  whom  sentence  was  pronounced  was  the 
unfortunate  Seneca,  who  had  in  vain  withdrawn  himself  from 
public  affairs,  in  vain  relinquished  to  the  emperor  the  riches 
he  supposed  him  to  covet.  He  had  long  lived  in  expectation 
of  this  catastrophe,  and  Nero  had  striven  to  reassure  him  by 
a show  of  confidence  and  regard.  Nero  might  indeed  be  in- 
different to  his  ancient  friend ; but  he  had  no  reason  to  bear 
him  malice.  It  was  to  Poppsea  more  probably  that  he  owed 
his  doom,  for  she  was  not  likely  to  forgive  the  zeal  with 
which  he  had  dissuaded  her  lover  from  repudiating  Octavia, 
and  she  felt  her  own  influence  to  depend  on  removing  from 
Death  of  Sen-  Nero’s  sight  even  the  shadow  of  honour  and  vir- 

eca-  tue.  It  is  some  consolation  to  be  assured  that 

his  end  was  composed  and  dignified.3  He  caused  his  veins  to 
be  opened  in  the  presence  of  his  friends  and  kindred,  and  con- 
tinued calmly  to  converse  with  them  through  the  protracted 
agony  of  a death,  which  his  age  and  the  sluggishness  of  his 
blood  rendered  peculiarly  painful.4 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  70.  The  lines  were  probably  those  of  Phars.  ix.  811.  foil. : 

“ Sanguis  erant  lachrymse ; qusecunque  foramina  novit 
Humor,  ab  his  largus  manat  cruor ; ora  redundant, 

Et  patulee  nares ; sudor  rubet ; omnia  plenis 
Membra  fluunt  venis : totum  est  pro  vulnere  corpus.” 

2 Comp.  iv.  575.:  “Ignoratque  datos  ne  quisquam  serviat  enses.”  x.  211.: 
“ Scire  mori  sors  prima  viris,  sed  proxima  cogi.” 

3 We  may  hope  that  there  is  no  truth  in  the  story  introduced  by  Dion,  that 
Seneca  urged  his  wife  Paulina  to  die  with  him,  to  show  how  successful  his  les- 
sons had  been  in  teaching  her  to  despise  death.  She  let  him  open  her  veins, 
we  are  told,  but  on  his  dying  first,  caused  them  to  be  bound  up  again.  Dion, 
lxii.  25. : Comp.  Tac.  Ann.  xv.  64. 

4 This  mode  of  bleeding  to  death  seems  to  have  been  so  commonly  adopted 


A.  U.  818.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


151 


The  threats  of  some,  and  even  the  calmness  of  his  other 
victims,  redoubled  Nero’s  alarm.  They  seemed  equally  to 
rely  on  speedy  vengeance,  to  point  to  unseen  avengers. 
Roused  to  wild  fury  by  the  necessities  of  self-defence,  he  ex- 
tended his  blows  from  the  actual  conspirators  to  Further  prose- 
many  more  whom  he  feared  and  suspected,  and  base°adu??tion 
his  thirst  for  their  blood  was  stimulated  by  the  °fthe  senate- 
glittering  prospect  of  rich  estates.  The  property  of  men  who 
had  been  suffered  to  die  by  their  own  hand  could  not  legally 
be  confiscated,  and  to  seize  it,  sentence  of  banishment  must 
issue  against  their  heirs,  or  they  must  be  removed  by  assassi- 
nation. Nero  invoked  the  skill  of  the  poisoners.  The  cour- 
age of  the  miserable  nobles  quailed  completely  before  the  ar- 
row which  flies  in  darkness.  For  every  execution,  for  every 
murder,  vows  and  sacrifices  were  offered  in  the  Capitol. 
Parents  thanked  the  gods  for  the  loss  of  their  children,  sons 
for  the  loss  of  their  fathers : the  palace  doors  were  hung  with 
garlands  by  the  relations  of  those  over  whom  the  prince  was 
declared  to  have  justly  triumphed.  Nero  himself  was  not 
unmindful  of  the  informers  whose  treachery  had  saved  him. 
Milichus,  besides  rewards  in  money,  received  the  title  of 
Preserver.  The  soldiers  were  enriched  with  a donative ; the 
populace  were  gratified  with  two  thousand  sesterces  each,  and 
an  ample  largess  of  corn.  Tigellinus  and  Nerva,  who  had 
conducted  the  inquiry,  were  honoured  with  triumphal  stat- 
ues.1 Nevertheless  Nero  seems  to  have  faintly  excused  his 
severity,  and  declared  in  an  harangue  to  the  senate,  that  he 
was  urged  by  no  private  feelings,  but  only  by  the  necessity 
of  his  position  and  the  demands  of  the  public  safety.  This 
sufficed  to  open  the  flood-gates  of  patrician  flattery.  The 

from  an  idea  that  it  was  comparatively  painless.  I have  heard  that  a high 
medical  authority  has  pronounced  it  to  be  much  the  reverse,  at  least  when  the 
circulation  is  languid.  In  such  cases  the  Romans  were  wont  to  accelerate  the 
flow  of  blood  with  the  warm  bath : Seneca,  in  his  impatience,  allowed  himself 
to  be  stifled  with  the  steam. 

1 This  Nerva  is  supposed  to  have  been  son  to  the  jurist  who  has  been  men- 
tioned as  intimate  with  Tiberius.  He  is  not  to  be  confounded  with  the  future 
emperor  of  the  same  name,  of  whom  he  may  have  been  the  father. 


152 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  65. 


most  shameless  decrees  followed  in  his  honour : thanks  and 
offerings  to  the  gods  were,  as  usual,  precipitately  voted,  and 
the  day  of  his  escape  was  recommended  to  perpetual  com- 
memoration. The  proposal  of  Anicius  Cerialis  to  erect  him 
a temple  forthwith,  was  only  put  timidly  aside  on  the  pre- 
tence that  it  might  seem  to  anticipate  his  death ; for  it  was 
only  after  death,  according  to  established  usage,  that  the 
emperor  could  be  pronounced  immortal.1 2 

But  already,  not  long  before  the  era  at  which  we  are  now 
arrived,  the  living  Nero  had  enjoyed  a poetical  apotheosis. 

Lucan  had  expressed,  in  the  fervour  of  his  vouth- 

Lncan’s  early  . A . , , * 

compliments  ful  intimacy  with  the  most  accomplished  of 

to  Nero.  , J 1 

princes,  the  sentiment  common  to  many  dream- 
ers of  the  day,  that  the  age  of  conflicts  and  disasters  through 
which  the  state  had  passed  was  requited  by  the  advent  of  a 
Nero  to  power.  This  was  a compensation  for  Pharsalia  and 
Munda,  for  Perusia  and  Philippi.  The  ruin  of  cities,  the  des- 
olation of  fields,  the  destruction  of  teeming  populations,  all 
were  repaid  by  the  prosperity  which  this  child  of  fortune 
was  to  inaugurate.  Even  the  gods  of  Olympus,  it  was  de- 
clared, could  not  enjoy  their  ever-blessed  sovereignty  till  they 
had  conquered  peace  by  the  overthrow  of  the  giants.3  There 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  74.  Modern  historians  have  followed  one  another  in  as- 
serting that  divine  honours  were  paid  by  Rome  to  the  living  Nero.  This  pas- 
sage, to  which  they  alone  blindly  refer,  proves  precisely  the  reverse.  “ Reperio 
in  commentariis  senatus  Cerialem  Anicium,  consulem  designatum,  pro  senten- 
tia  dixisse,  ut  templum  D.  Neroni  quam  maturrime  publica  pecunia  poneretur. 
Quod  quidem  ille  decernebat  (proposed),  tanquam  mortale  fastigium  egresso 

The  remainder  of  the  sentence  is  corrupt,  but  the  context  implies  that  the 
proposal  was  rejected.  Setting  aside  the  momentary  freaks  of  Caligula,  no  Ro- 
man emperor,  at  least  for  the  first  two  centuries,  allowed  himself  to  be  wor- 
shipped by  the  citizens ; “ Jurabit  Roma  per  umbras ,”  was  the  worst  in  this 
respect  that  republican  indignation  could  say  of  them. 

2 Lucan,  Phars.  i.  37. : 

“ Jam  nihil,  0 superi,  querimur ; scelera  ipsa  nefasque 
Hac  mercede  placent,”  &c. 

It  was  not  till  a later  period  that  Nero  affected  to  close  the  temple  of  Janus, 
“ tanquam  nullo  residuo  bello  ; ” the  true  reading  apparently  of  Suet.  Ner.  13. : 


A.  U.  818.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


153 


is  more,  I believe,  in  this  encomium  than  merely  extravagant 
flattery.  Setting  aside  the  vaunted  merits  of  the  Popular  antici. 
prince  himself,  in  which  none  but  juvenile  triflers 
should  have  seen  much  to  admire,  the  age  seems  nary  fohcity- 
to  have  been  impressed  with  signs  which  to  more  thought- 
ful men  betokened  extraordinary  felicity.  A blaze  of  luxury 
dazzled  all  eyes.  The  profusion  of  the  higher  classes  was 
taken  for  a proof  of  their  wealth;  but  wealthy  they  undoubt- 
edly were  beyond  all  former  experience.  The  rapidity  with 
which  fortunes  were  made,  as  it  were  underground,  by  the 
ministers  of  the  imperial  government,  even  by  freedmen  and 
slaves,  urged  men  to  projects  and  speculations,  to  secret  in- 
vestments, and  distant  enterprises.  It  would  appear  that  the 
great  and  ancient  families,  which  had  escaped  the  proscrip- 
tions of  recent  tyrants,  had  removed  the  sources  of  their 
abundance  from  the  observation  of  the  central  government ; 
and  the  riches  they  displayed  in  the  capital  might  seem  to 
have  dropped  from  the  clouds,  or  sprung  from  the  bosom  of 
the  soil.  Presently  the  public  was  amazed  to  learn  that  one 
half  of  the  province  of  Africa  was  held  in  fee  by  six  noble 
families  of  Rome.  Such  is  the  statement  of  a contemporary, 
and  no  doubt  that  statement  was  believed.1  The  existence 
of  these  vast  appropriations,  indeed,  was  only  made  known 
by  their  confiscation.  But  when  the  emperor’s  eyes  were 
once  directed  to  that  land  of  fabled  riches,  the  seat  of  the 
famous  garden  of  the  Hesperides,  it  was  easy  to  palm  fictions 
upon  him,  which  should  exceed  the  glowing  real-  Pretended  dis- 
ities  of  the  fortune  he  enjoyed.  A strange  story  JrSresof16 
is  told  of  a brainless  projector,  a man  of  Punic  Dido* 

but  anticipations  of  a golden  age  of  peace  to  follow  when  he  should  be  trans- 
lated to  divine  power  in  the  skies  were  already  popular : 

“ Turn  genus  humanum  positis  sibi  consulat  armis, 

Inque  vicem  gens  omnis  amet : pax  missa  per  orbem 
Ferrea  belligeri  compescat  limina  Jani.” 

1 Plin.  Hist.  Nat.  xviii.  7.  3.  Speaking  of  the  pernicious  extent  of  private 
domains  in  Italy  and  the  provinces : “ Sex  domini  semissem  Africse  possidebant, 
quum  interfecit  eos  Nero  princeps.” 


154 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  65. 


origin,  named  Cesellius  Bassus,  who  was  persuaded,  appar- 
ently by  a dream,  that  a hoard  of  gold,  in  bars  and  ingots, 
was  to  be  found  in  a cave  on  his  own  land,  which  he  presum- 
ed to  be  the  deposit  of  Dido,  queen  of  Carthage.1  He  cross- 
ed the  sea,  and  hastened  to  acquaint  the  prince  of  the  treas- 
ure-trove, which  by  law  accrued  to  the  fiscus.  Access  to 
Nero,  even  on  such  an  errand,  could  only  be  obtained  by 
money,  and  Bassus  purchased  at  a handsome  price  admittance 
for  his  glittering  tale.  For  its  truth  indeed  he  had  no  evi- 
dence to  offer,  nor,  it  seems,  was  any  demanded.  The  spend- 
thrift’s hopes  were  unclouded  by  misgivings.  He  allowed  the 
story  to  be  circulated  through  Home,  and  regaled  his  ears, 
while  his  preparations  were  in  progress,  with  the  flattery  of 
his  courtiers,  who  continued  to  inflame  his  expectations.  At 
the  same  moment  the  Quinquennial  games  were  in  course  of 
celebration,  and  the  circumstance  was  seized  by  the  poets  and 
declaimers  to  dilate  on  the  prince’s  fortune,  for  whom  the  soil 
bore  not  her  accustomed  fruits  only,  nor  her  precious  metals 
alloyed  with  dross  and  earth,  but  the  pure  ore  itself,  already 
refined  for  use.  Fired  with  these  glowing  benedictions,  he 
plunged  into  deeper  prodigality  than  ever.  He  became  reck- 
less in  the  profusion  of  treasures  which  he  believed  to  be  un- 
limited ; the  treasury  was  speedily  exhausted  in  the  anticipa- 
tion of  unbounded  replenishment.  But  the  officers  sent  un- 
der the  guidance  of  Bassus  to  recover  the  hoards  he  had  in- 
dicated, spent  their  time  in  exploring  and  digging  to  no  pur- 
pose. The  people  and  the  soldiers  of  the  province  turned  out 
in  crowds  to  witness  the  search  and  to  protect  it.  After  ex- 
amining, spade  in  hand,  every  corner  of  the  wretched  man’s 
estate,  with  more  patience  than  his  crazy  tale  deserved,  they 
were  obliged  at  last  to  report  the  total  disappointment  of 
their  hopes ; and  he  either  put  himself  to  death  in  despair, 
or,  according  to  another  account,  was  sent  in  chains  to 
Borne  to  answer  for  his  folly  or  his  crime.2 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  1. : “ Lateres  (ingots)  praegraves  jacere,  adstantibus  parte 
alia  columnis  ” (bars.) 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  1-3.  a.  u.  818,  a.  d.  65.  It  was  even  affirmed  by  some 
that  the  culprit  was  contemptuously  released. 


A.  U.  818.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


155 


What  remains  of  the.  year  818,  the  most  fertile  perhaps 
in  all  our  annals  in  marked  contrasts  of  the  horrid  and  lu- 
dicrous, of  public  and  private  sufferings,  of  bar- 

, _ r . . i a i Nero’s  per- 

barous  cruelty  and  frantic  resistance,  shall  be  formancein 

* tli6  theatre 

told  nearly  in  the  words  of  Tacitus  himself.  The 
senate , the  historian  says,  on  the  return  of  the  Neronian 
( Quinquennial ) games,  anxious  to  avert  a public  scandal , 
offered  the  emperor  the  prize  for  song  and  crown  of  eloquence , 
without  the  show  of  a contest . But  Nero , protesting  that  he 
required  no  favour , insisted  on  being  pitted  against  his  rivals , 
and  earning  his  honours  by  the  sworn  award  of  the  judges. 
First , he  simply  recites  a poem  on  the  stage  ; then , implored 
by  the  populace  to  exhibit  all  his  accomplishments , he  plays 
and  dances  before  them , observing  in  every  particular  the 
rules  prescribed  to  the  performers , who  must  not  sit  down  to 
rest  themselves , nor  wipe  their  brows  with  a handkerchief 
Finally , bowing  the  knee , and  making  a professional  salute , 
he  awaited  the  judges ’ decision  with  a show  of  bashful  ap- 
prehension,,l  And  the  populace  too , wont  to  follow  every 
movement  of  the  actor  with  voice  and  gesture,  cheered  through- 
out in  concert.  They  seemed  to  be  really  delighted ; and  so 
perhaps  they  were,  so  reckless  viere  they  of  the  national  dis- 
honour. But  the  spectators  from  remoter  burgs  of  Italy, 
still  retaining  some  antique  notions,  those  too  from  the  prov- 

1 Nero’s  vocal  and  musical  powers  are  thus  described  in  the  dialogue  which 
bears  his  name  included  in  the  works  of  Lucian.  “ His  voice  is  unnaturally 
deep  and  hollow  (comp.  Lucan’s  jest,  ‘ Sub  terris  tonuisse  putes  ’),  and  seems 
to  buzz  in  his  throat  with  a disagreeable  sound,  which,  however,  he  mitigates 
by  modulating  it  carefully  to  music.  His  skill  as  a singer  is  not  contemptible, 
except  inasmuch  as  it  is  contemptible  in  an  emperor  to  attend  to  such  things 
at  all.  But  when  he  enacts  the  part  of  the  Gods,  how  ludicrous  he  is ! yawn 
the  hearers  must,  in  spite  of  a thousand  perils.  For  he  nods,  drawing  a long 
breath,  squares  his  toes,  raises  himself  to  the  utmost,  and  bends  back  like  a 
man  bound  to  the  wheel.  Naturally  of  a sanguine  complexion,  his  visage  now 
glows  with  a deeper  red.”  Then  follows  the  story  of  a tragedian,  who  per- 
sisted in  contending  for  the  prize  against  him,  with  great  applause  from  the 
audience,  but  much  to  Nero’s  mortification,  who  set  on  some  of  the  players  to 
attack  him  and  beat  him  to  death. 


156 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  65. 


inces  who  were  strangers  to  the  abandoned  habits  of  the  city , 
were  ashamed  and  affronted ; and  these , when  they  refused  to 
clap  their  hands , and  even  hindered  the  hired  applauders , were 
beaten  by  the  soldiers  posted  among  the  seats.  Many  knights 
were  trodden  down  in  trying  to  make  their  way  out : others 
were  seriously  injured  by  keeping  their  places  a day  and  a 
night  without  intermission,  fearing  to  be  denounced  if  they 
absented  themselves  for  a moment,  by  spies  set  to  watch  every 
movement  even  of  their  countenances . Of  the  poorer  sort, 
indeed,  many  were  punished  on  this  account  on  the  spot : 
against  the  nobler  the  ill-will  of  the  emperor  was  treasured 
for  future  manifestation 

After  the  conclusion  of  the  games  died  Poppcea,  from  the 
chance  violence  of  her  husband,  who  kicked  her  when  in  a 
Death  of  Pop-  state  of  pregnancy : for  I cannot  believe  in  the 
Sonour^paidto  siorV  °f  poison,  though  asserted  by  some  writers, 
her-  from  mere  hatred,  as  I believe,  to  Nero  ; for  he 

was  anxious  for  children,  and  greatly  enamoured  of  his  wife. 
Her  body  was  not  consumed  by  fire,  as  is  the  Roman  custom  ; 
but  embalmed  after  the  manner  of  foreign  kings,  and  thus  in- 
troduced into  the  sepulchre  of  the  Julii.  The  obsequies,  how- 
ever, were  publicly  solemnized,  and  Nero  himself  pronounced 
her  eulogy  from  the  rostrum,  praising  her  beauty , declaring 
that  she  was  the  mother  of  a divine  infant  (a  daughter  she 
had  lately  borne  him,  already  dead),  and  representing  her  other 
gifts  of  fortune  in  the  light  of  personal  merits .a 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  4,  5. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  6. : Suet.  Ner.  35. : Dion,  lxii.  27.  Our  author  does  not 
mention,  though  he  afterwards  alludes  to  the  fact  as  if  mentioned,  that  the 
senate  decreed  divine  honours  to  Poppsea.  Embalming,  after  the  fashion  of 
the  Egyptians  and  the  Greek  sovereigns  in  the  East,  from  a symbol  of  immor- 
tality easily  slid  into  a symbol  of  divinity.  Pliny  has  a remarkable  statement 
that  the  amount  of  spices  consumed  at  Poppsea’s  funeral  exceeded  a whole 
year’s  produce  of  Arabia  (xii.  41.).  This  would  naturally  be  understood  to 
refer  to  the  burning  of  her  body,  and  the  critics  are  perplexed  at  the  apparent 
discrepancy  between  the  two  authors,  nor  do  I think  they  are  successful  in 
reconciling  them.  I fear  it  must  be  considered  one  of  the  blunders  which 
Pliny,  in  his  haste  and  indiscriminate  appetite  for  miscellaneous  information, 


A.  U.  818.  j 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


157 


The  death  of  Foppoea , much  mourned  in  public , not  less 
blest  in  secret  from  the  sense  of  her  shamelessness  and  cruelty , 
was  the  more  bitterly  considered  from  Nero’s 

~ J . , Proscription  of 

forbidding  6.  Cassius  to  appear  at  her  funeral . c.  Cassius  and 
„ . * f . .7  , . , L.  Silanus. 

1 his  was  the  first  sign  of  the  coming  evil , which 

was  not  long  delayed . Silanus  was  included  in  the  same 
proscription  / m'tfA  wo  charge  against  either , except  that 
Cassius  was  eminent  for  ancestral  wealth  and  high  consider- 
ation, Silanus  for  illustrious  birth  and  youthful  modesty. 
Such  were  the  crimes  for  which  Nero  sent  a message  to  the 
senate , in  which  he  insisted  that  they  should  both  be  removed 
from  the  commonwealth,  objecting  to  Cassius  that  among  the 
images  of  his  ancestors  he  venerated  the  bust  of  the  tyrannic 
^ cide  inscribed  the  Party-Leader.  This,  he  said,  was  to  sow 
the  seeds  of  a civil  war,  to  urge  a revolt  against  the  family 
of  the  Caesars.  Moreover  he  had  attached  to  himself  Silanus, 
a restless  and  turbulent  stripling,  to  lure  the  disaffected  to  re- 
bellion. Silanus , he  declared,  had  presumed  already  to  prom- 
ise posts  and  places : a charge  as  frivolous  as  false  / for 
Silanus,  thoroughly  cowed  by  the  death  of  his  uncle  Torquatus , 
was  only  anxious  to  secure  his  own  safety.  JBut  further, 
the  prince  suborned  delators  to  accuse  Lepida,  the  wife  of 
Cassius  and  aunt  to  Silanus,  of  incestuous  intercourse  with 
her  nephew,  and  the  practice  of  magical  rites.  Certain  sen- 
ators, Vulcatius  and  Marcellus , and  a Jcnight,  Calpurnius 
Fabatus,  were  arrested  as  his  accomplices ; these  men,  how- 
ever, got  a respite  by  appealing  to  the  prince,  and  eventually 
escaped,  from  their  insignificance,  among  the  greater  crimi- 

has  too  often  committed.  With  this  memento  before  us  we  may  allow  some 
distrust  of  another  statement  also,  that  Poppaea  was  always  followed  by  a troop 
of  five  hundred  she-asses  to  provide  her  a bath  of  milk,  as  a cosmetic,  daily. 
That  her  mules  were  shod  with  gold  we  may,  if  we  please,  admit.  It  should 
be  observed  that  Dion’s  repetition  of  these  stories  is  no  confirmation  of  them. 
It  is  remarkable  that  Josephus  {Antiq.  Jud.  xx.  7.  11.)  calls  this  wretched 
creature  “ a devout  woman,”  d£oae(3i)c  yap  rjv.  Perhaps  she  patronized  the 
Jewish  freedmen  connected  with  the  palace;  possibly  she  discountenanced  the 
Christian  converts.  Josephus  was,  however,  under  some  personal  obligations 
to  her.  See  Joseph.  Vit.  3.  On  this  point  more  will  be  said  in  another  place. 


158 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  65. 


nals  by  whom  Nero's  attention  was  engaged.  On  Cassius 
and  Silanus  exile  was  pronounced  by  decree  of  the  senate. 
JLepida  was  left  to  the  emperor's  judgment.  Cassius  teas 
transported  to  Sardinia  to  die  there  of  old  age  : Silanus  was 
removed  to  Ostia  to  be  sent  to  Naxus  / but  he  was  presently 
confined  in  Barium , a town  of  Apulia.  While  enduring 
there  his  undeserved  misfortune  with  the  fortitude  of  a phi- 
losopher, he  was  laid  hands  on  by  a centurion  under  orders 
to  hill  him . He  declared  himself  well  prepared  to  die,  but  he 
would  not  suffer  a cut-throat  to  claim  the  honour  of  slaying 
him.  Such , though  unarmed,  were  his  vigour  and  resolution 
that  the  centurion  was  obliged  to  call  his  men  to  hold  him  / 
yet  he  struggled  against  him  with  his  bare  hands  till  despatch- 
ed at  last  with  cut  and  thrust,  as  if  in  regular  combat ,l 2 

Nor  less  sudden  was  the  destruction  of  Lucius  Vetus,  his 
mother-in-law  Sextia,  and  his  daughter  Pollutia,  objects  of 
Death  of  Lucius  hatred  to  the  prince  because  their  mere  existence 
motherland  seemed  to  reproach  him  with  the  slaughter  ofBiir 
daughter.  bellius  Plautus,  the  son-in-law  of  Vetus.*  Nero 
first  discovered  his  feelings  on  hearing  the  delation  of  For - 
tunatus , a freedman  of  Vetus , and  of  Claudius  Demianus , 
a man  whom  Vetus,  when  proconsul  of  Asia,  had  cast  into 
prison  for  his  crimes.  When  the  accused  was  informed  of 
the  hind  of  witnesses  who  icere  pitted  against  him,  he  quits 
Borne  for  his  Formian  villa.  Soldiers  are  sent  to  surround 
and  watch  him  at  a distance.  His  daughter  was  with  him, 
still  brooding  over  the  recollection  of  her  husband's  death,  of 
the  murder  she  had  herself  witnessed,  of  the  severed  head  she 
had  embraced.  She  preserved  his  blood-stained  garments  as 
a widow  and  a mourner,  taking  only  meat  and  drink  suffi- 
cient to  sustain  her  alive.  At  her  father's  desire  she  now  re- 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  '7-9.  This  was  the  L.  Junius  Torquatus  Silanus  referred 
to  in  a preceding  note. 

2 This  L.  Vetus  is  mentioned  in  Ann.  xiv.  58.  by  the  name  of  L.  Antistius. 
He  was  consul  with  Nero  in  the  first  year  of  his  reign,  a.  d.  55.  He  command- 
ed afterwards  in  the  Upper  Germany,  and  proposed  to  connect  the  Rhine  and 
Saone  with  a canal.  Ann.  xiii.  53.  See  above,  ch.  li. 


A.  U.  818.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


159 


pairs  to  the  emperor  at  Naples , and  access  being  denied  her , 
haunts  his  door  to  extort  an  audience , calling  on  him  to  hear 
the  innocent , not  to  surrender  to  a freedman  his  own  colleague 
in  the  consulship , sometimes  with  womanish  lamentations , and 
again , casting  off  her  sex , toz7A  threats  and  frantic  violence , 
£/ie  prince's  obduracy  moved  the  disgust  of  all  beholders. 
Then  at  last  she  bids  her  father  abandon  hope , and  bear  what 
is  beyond  help.  The  trial , he  hears , 2$  impending , and  a 
severe  sentence  prepared.  Friends  advised  him  to  make 
Caesar  heir  to  the  bulk  of  his  property,  and  secure,  perchance, 
the  remainder  for  his  grandchildren.  Tut  this  counsel  he 
rejected,  and  least  by  a last  act  of  base  submission,  he  should 
disgrace  a life  which  had  bordered  on  independence,  first  di- 
vided his  money  and  furniture  among  his  slaves — all  but 
three  couches  retained  for  a triple  bier / — then  himself,  his 
daughter,  and  his  mother,  together  in  one  chamber,  with  the 
same  steel  sever  one  another's  veins  / — wrapped  each,  for 
decency,  in  a single  blanket,  they  are  laid  hastily  in  the 
vapour-bath,  each  gazing  on  the  others  and  praying  to  be  the 
first  to  die,  and  leave  the  others  dying  yet  still  alive.  And 
fortune  maintained  the  proper  order : the  elders  died  first 
and  last  the  latest  born.  They  were  tried  after  their  burial: 
it  was  decreed  that  they  should  suffer  after  the  manner  of  the 
ancients.  Nero  pretended  to  forbid  this  severity , allowing 
them  forsooth  to  die  in  private  : such  was  the  mockery  super- 
added  after  they  were  dead  and  gone. 

Publius  Gallus,  a Roman  knight,  was  interdicted  fire  and 
water,  because  he  had  been  intimate  with  Fenius  Rufus, 
and  on  no  distant  terms  with  Fetus.  The  freed-  Name  of  the 
man  and  accuser  were  rewarded  for  their  pains  San!m<Uoius 
with  seats  in  the  theatre  among  the  tribunds  jiSu^toGer- 
attendants.  And  the  month  which  followed  manicus- 
April  ( called  now  Neronian)  was  changed  from  Maius  to 
Claudius,  while  Pune  assumed  the  name  of  Germanicus, 
because,  as  Cornelius  Orfitus  in  proposing  the  change  declared, 
the  name  of  Junius  had  been  rendered  ominous  by  the  deaths 
of  two  guilty  Torquati. 


160 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


This  year , disgraced  by  so  many  deeds  of  horror , was 
further  distinguished  by  the  Gods  with  storms  and  sicknesses. 
Campania  and  Campania  was  devastated  by  a hurricane  which 
hood  ofSEbo°me'  overthrew  buildings , trees,  and  the  fruits  of  the 
stormsdand  pes-  so^  everV  direction , even  to  the  gates  of  the 
tiience.  city,  within  which  a pestilence  thinned  all  ranks 

of  the  population , with  no  atmospheric  disturbance  that  the 
eye  could  trace.  The  houses  were  choked  with  dead , the  roads 
with  funerals  : neither  sex  nor  age  escaped.  Slaves  and  free 
men  perished  equally  amidst  the  wailings  of  their  wives  and 
children , who  were  often  hurried  to  the  pyre  by  which  they 
had  sate  in  tears , and  consumed  together  with  them.  The 
deaths  of  knights  and  senators,  promiscuous  as  they  were , 
’ deserved  the  less  to  be  lamented,  inasmuch  as  falling  by  the 
common  lot  of  mortality  they  seemed  to  anticipate  the  prince? s 
cruelty .* 

We  have  seen  in  these  extracts  a graphic  representation 
of  the  mingled  farce  and  tragedy  which  one  man’s  wanton- 
, ness,  and  the  snpineness  of  the  million,  allowed 

Melancholy  re-  . A 

flections  of  to  he  inflicted  on  the  great  Roman  people ; and 

Tacitus  on  his  ....  . r f 

task  as  an  his-  the  disaster  with  which  it  concludes,  the  visita- 
tion of  a superior  Providence,  though  in  the 
actual  amount  of  suffering  far  more  terrible,  is  felt  as  a relief 
because  at  least  it  brought  with  it  no  stigma  upon  humanity. 
The  thirty  thousand  victims  who  were  registered  in  this  sin- 
gle autumn  in  the  temple  of  Libitina,  may  be  compared  with 
twice  that  number  entered  in  the  bills  of  mortality  in  the 
course  of  eighteen  months  in  the  great  plague  of  London.1 2 3 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  10-13.  The  account  of  this  year  concludes  with  a notice 
of  the  prince’s  liberality  to  the  city  of  Lugdunum,  to  which  he  repaid  a large 
sum  it  had  formerly  presented  to  Rome,  on  the  occasion  perhaps  of  the  fire. 
Read  with  Ritter  urhis  for  turbidis  (casibus),  and  comp.  xv.  45.  “ conferendis 
pecuniis  pervastata  Italia,  provinciae  eversae,”  &c. 

2 Comp.  Suet.  JVer.  39.:  “Pestilentia  unius  auctumni  quo  triginta  millia  ad 

rationem  Libitinse  venerunt.”  It  is  needless  to  say  that  this  statement  affords 
no  adequate  ground  for  calculating,  with  Brotier  and  others,  the  population  of 
Rome ; but  it  is  important  as  showing  the  care  and  method  with  which  the 
register  of  deaths  was  kept. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


161 


But  Nero,  who  it  seems  had  fled  from  the  contagion  to  his 
Campanian  watering-places,  still  continued  to  exercise  the 
same  cruelty  as  before,  and  the  year  819  commenced  with 
another  iniquitous  process,  which  destroyed  two  nobles,  one 
of  them  a son  of  Ostorius  Scapula,  himself  a soldier  of  repu- 
tation.1 He  was  already  afraid  of  his  own  officers,  of  the 
men  of  action,  not  of  words,  the  men  who  swayed  the  affec- 
tion of  the  legions  to  which  his  own  person  was  unknown. 
Here  Tacitus  pauses  for  a moment,  as  if  overcome  by  the  hor- 
ror of  his  subject,  and  embodies  in  despairing  language  his 
distress  at  the  prostration  of  his  countrymen’s  energies,  while 
he  justifies  the  sad  interest  with  which  he  still  lingers  over  it. 
Even , he  says,  were  I relating  foreign  wars , and  deaths  en- 
dured for  the  republic , I should  both  fatigue  myself  and  ex- 
pect to  fatigue  my  readers  vnth  the  same  unvaried  tale  of 
sad  though  not  dishonourable  ends.  But  now  the  servile  pa- 
tience of  the  sufferers , and  the  loss  of  so  much  blood  at  home , 
oppress  the  soul  and  overwhelm  it  with  melancholy.  Nor 
would  I ask  of  those  to  whom  these  horrors  shall  become 
known  any  other  indulgence  for  the  wretches  who  perished  so 
pusillanimously , but  to  ref  rain  from  detesting  them.  It  was 
the  wrath  of  the  Gods  against  the  Roman  state  ; not  such  as , 
in  the  case  of  armies  worsted  or  cities  taken , may  once  be 
noted , and  then  passed  over  in  silence.  We  owe  it  to  the 
posterity  of  illustrious  nobles  to  recount  all  their  deaths 
separately , just  as  the  obsequies  of  each  are  distinguished 
from  the  common  herd  of  funerals .2  And  so,  with  these 
bitter  words,  he  returns  again  to  his  task,  and  proceeds  with 
dogged  endurance  to  record  the  names  and  fortunes  of  the 
sufferers  of  the  years  which  followed.  A chance  which  he 
did  not  anticipate,  but  which  he  would  hardly  have  regretted, 
has  abridged  the  story  of  these  gloomy  times,  and  confined 
the  remaining  pages  of  our  author’s  annals  to  little  more  than 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  14,  15. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  16.:  “Detur  hoc  illustrium  virorum  posteritati,  ut  quo- 
modo  exsequiis  a promiscua  sepultura  separantur,  ita  in  tradititione  supremoram 
accipiant  habeantque  propriam  memoriam.” 

vol  vi. — 11 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


162 


[A.  D.  66. 


a single  subject,  to  which  we,  too,  must  follow  him  with  re- 
spect and  sympathy. 

Before,  however,  we  proceed  to  the  crowning  enormity 
of  the  death  of  Thrasea,  another  proscription  must  be  noticed, 
partly  as  involving  one  name  at  least  of  historical 

Death  of  An-  r . ® ...  . 

nams  Meia,  fa-  notoriety,  partly  as  illustrating  the  horrors  under 
which  the  Roman  nobles  at  this  time  lived  and  per- 
ished. Annaeus  Mela,  Rufius  Crispinus,  Anicius  Cerialis,  and 
C.  Petronius  were  involved  in  the  same  fate  almost  at  the  same 
moment.  Crispinus,  it  seems,  was  a public  character ; he  had 
been  prefect  of  the  praetorians  and  worn  the  consular  orna- 
ments ; such  being  the  case  he  became  an  object  of  jealousy 
to  aspiring  courtiers,  and  liable  to  false  accusation.  Charged 
accordingly  with  participation  in  some  recent  conspiracy, 
probably  that  of  Piso,  he  had  been  banished  to  Sardinia, 
where  he  soon  put  an  end  to  his  own  life.  But  Mela  had 
preferred  a private  station  to  the  perils  of  a more  conspicu- 
ous career.1  This  man  was  the  brother  of  Gallio  and  Seneca, 
and  seems  to  have  partaken  of  the  Epicurean  indifference  of 
the  one,  together  with  the  love  of  money  which  casts  a stigma 
on  the  other.  Not  seeking  to  rise  above  the  rank  of  knight- 
hood, he  had  amassed  wealth  for  himself  while  replenishing 
the  imperial  fiscus  in  the  provinces.  He  was  father,  how- 


1 I have  mentioned  the  three  sons  of  M.  Annaeus  Seneca  the  rhetorcian  in 
chapter  xli. : “ docti  Senecae  ter  numeranda  domus.” — Mart.  iv.  40.  Of  these 
Novatus  took  the  name  of  Gallio  after  adoption  by  M.  Junius  Gallio.  He  is 
generally  supposed  to  be  the  Gallio  mentioned  in  Acts  xviii.  12.  as  proconsul 
of  Achaia  under  Claudius.  His  mildness  of  character  (“  caring  for  none  of  these 
things”)  is  referred  to  by  Statius  (Sylv.  ii.  7.  32.):  “dulcem  generasse  Gallio- 
nem and  by  Seneca  (JVat.  Qu.  praef.  iv.) : “ quern  nemo  non  parum  amat, 
etiam  qui  amare  plus  non  potest the  false  brilliancy  of  his  style  by  Tacitus 
(de  Orat.  26.):  “tinnitus  Gallionis.”  The  brothers  seem  to  have  been  all  ad- 
dicted to  letters.  I know  not  why  M.  Nisard,  in  his  Etudes  sur  les  Ppetes  latins 
(i.  89.),  in  advancing  his  theory  that  the  Tragedies  which  go  under  the  name  of 
Seneca  were  written  by  different  members  of  the  family  (Senecanum  opus,  he 
calls  them),  excludes  Gallio  from  the  partnership.  M.  Nisard  cannot  inform  us 
how  the  authorship  of  the  several  plays  is  to  be  distributed,  except  that  he 
gives  the  Octavia , as  the  worst,  decidedly  to  Lucan.  I think  myself  that  there 
is  strong  evidence  of  L.  Seneca  being  author  of  some  at  least  of  them. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


163 


ever,  to  Lucan,  a relation  which,  however  honourable,  ex- 
posed him  to  danger  and  led  ultimately  to  his  ruin.  After 
his  son’s  death,  he  had  shown,  it  is  said,  peculiar  keenness  in 
collecting  the  debts  due  to  him,  and  in  so  doing  had  offended 
a certain  Fabius  Rusticus,  who  charged  him  in  revenge  with 
complicity  in  the  crime.  His  wealth  insured  his  condemna- 
tion. Forged  letters  were  produced,  a case  of  Majestas  was 
vamped  up,  and  Mela,  after  bequeathing  a large  part  of  his 
estates  to  Tigellinus,  in  hope  of  preserving  the  remnant  for 
his  heirs,  shrank  from  the  anxiety  of  a trial  by  opening  his 
own  veins.  But  to  his  last  will  he  had  appended  a word  of 
complaint  at  being  thus  compelled  to  die  in  his  innocence, 
while  Crispinus  and  Cerialis,  the  prince’s  real  enemies,  were 
allowed  to  survive  him.  The  first  indeed,  as  we  have  seen, 
had  already  destroyed  himself : the  other,  on  finding  his  own 
life  menaced,  speedily  took  the  same  course.  Petronius,  who 
was  sacrificed  to  the  jealousy  of  Tigellinus,  seems  to  have  been 
a man  of  more  remarkable  character  than  any  of 

. . i n Character  and 

these.  His  sentiments  and  habits  were  those  of  death  of  Pe- 
a Maecenas,  transferred  to  a corrupter  age,  and 
confined  to  a lower  sphere.  He  had  governed  Bithynia,  and 
become  subsequently  consul ; and  in  these  high  offices  he  had 
shown,  like  his  trusty  prototype,  activity  and  vigilance.  But 
when  released  from  public  trammels,  choice  and  policy  com- 
bined to  dispose  him  to  the  enjoyment  of  ease  and  luxury  in 
a private  station : his  days  were  passed  in  slumber,  his  nights 
devoted  to  genial  dissipation.  If  he  still  occupied  a large 
space  in  the  eyes  of  the  citizens,  it  was  owing  to  his  refined 
taste,  to  the  exquisiteness  of  his  luxury,  and  the  elegance  of 
his  debauches ; and  all  he  said  and  did  was  repeated  with 
admiration  of  his  studied  ease,  or,  to  borrow  a phrase  of 
his  own,  its  curious  felicity.  Petronius  was  admitted, 
with  the  choicest  profligates  of  the  day,  to  the  prince’s 
intimacy,  and  stood  so  high  in  his  confidence  as  to  be  en- 
titled the  Arbiter  of  the  Imperial  Pleasures.  Nothing  was 
grateful,  nothing  was  admired  in  luxury,  but  what  had 
the  stamp  of  his  approbation.  But  here  he  invaded  the 


164 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


fA.  D.  66. 


province  coveted  by  Tigellinns.  Two  favourites  could  not 
sit  so  near  the  throne  together.  Tigellinns  proved  the 
craftier : he  accused  his  rival  of  a guilty  intimacy  with  the 
traitor  Scasvinus,  and  having  suborned  a slave  to  depose 
against  him,  deprived  him  by  an  adroit  manoeuvre  of  the 
means  of  defence.  Nero  was  at  the  time  in  Campania,  and 
Petronius  was  seized  on  his  way  to  visit  him,  and  detained 
far  from  all  assistance  at  Cumae.  W e hear  no  more  in  this 
age  of  the  judicial  contests  of  the  delators  under  Tiberius. 
Accusers  had  not  now  the  opportunity  of  making  themselves 
famous  for  their  oratory.  Their  hateful  trade  was  no  longer 
gilded  even  by  the  false  glory  of  eloquence.  Petronius,  like 
so  many  others,  resolved  at  once  to  anticipate  trial  and  sen- 
tence by  suicide.  The  manner  indeed  in  which  he  proceeded 
to  yield  his  life  was  singular.  Summoning  his  friends  to  his 
presence,  he  opened  his  veins  in  the  course  of  their  conversa- 
tion, bound  them,  and  opened  them  again,  as  its  interest 
warmed  or  languished.  But  their  talk  was  not  of  matters 
of  philosophy  or  the  question  of  the  soul’s  immortality  : they 
only  recited  trifling  compositions,  and  improvised  verses.  To 
some  of  his  slaves  he  made  presents,  others  he  caused  to  be 
punished.  He  lay  down  to  supper,  composed  himself  to  sleep, 
and  sought  to  give  his  death  the  appearance,  and  if  possible 
the  sensations,  of  a natural  end.  In  his  will  he  refused  to 
follow  the  mode  of  flattering  the  emperor  or  his  creatures, 
and  filled  a codicil  with  the  indignant  recital  of  their  enormi- 
ties. He  signed  and  sealed,  and  transmitted  this  document 
to  the  tyrant.  Finally,  he  broke  his  signet,  that  it  might 
never  again  be  used  to  bring  the  guiltless  into  peril ; and 
dashed  in  pieces  a costly  murrhine  vase,  to  deprive  Nero  of 
the  relic  which  he  knew  him  most  ardently  to  covet.1 

1 Plin.  Hist.  Nat.  xxxvii.  7.  As  regards  the  authorship  of  the  Saiiricon , 
which  goes  under  the  name  of  Petronius  Arbiter,  the  reader  may  refer  to  the 
elaborate  arguments  of  Studer  in  the  Hheinisches  Museum,  1843.  This  writer 
maintains  the  old  view.  He  collects  allusions  to  the  age  of  Nero  and  the  early 
emperors : as  1.  in  the  reflections  on  the  decline  of  eloquence,  c.  1.  (comp,  the 
Dial,  de  Orat.  c.  35.) ; 2.  on  the  wealth  and  manners  of  freedmen  (comp.  Plin. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


165 


Our  sole  relief  in  tracing  the  bloody  records  of  the  Nero- 
nian  tyranny  is  the  reflection  that  its  victims,  ill-used  as  they 
were,  were  seldom  worthy  of  a happier  fate : in  most  at  least 
of  the  cases  we  have  noticed,  they  were  among  the  basest, 
the  most  abandoned,  and,  when  occasion  offered,  the  most 
barbarous  of  their  countrymen.  We  may  presume  that  the 
indifference  with  which  citizens,  provincials,  and  slaves  wit- 
nessed the  massacre  of  their  chiefs,  their  patrons,  their  masters, 
was  derived  from  a strong  sense  of  the  iniquity  of  their 
career,  their  crimes  and  vices.  W e pay  the  tribute  of  a sigh 
to  the  fate  of  Britannicus  and  Oct-avia,  innocent  as  they  yet 
were  in  the  first  bloom  of  youth ; but  we  confess  that  they 
too,  had  they  been  suffered  to  live  a few  years  longer,  would 
probably  have  lived  to  deserve  all  their  sorrows.  But  the 
crowning  crime  of  Xero  was  of  a different  stamp ; for  its  vic- 
tims were  men  of  acknowledged  honour  and  probity.  JVero 
at  last , says  Tacitus,  yearned  to  destroy  Virtue  itself, ’ in  the 
persons  of  Pcetus  Tkrasea  and  Barea  Soranus. 

These  two  illustrious  names  have  been  thus  joined  to- 
gether by  Tacitus,  and  the  connexion  shall  not  be  severed, 
though  it  does  not  appear  that  there  was  any  al- 

i „ . , . . . , J Paetus  Thrasca 

liance  m blood  or  friendship  between  them,  nor  and  Barea  So- 
were  they  in  fact  involved  in  a common  proscrip- 
tion. They  were  united  in  the  protest  of  their  noble  lives 
against  the  iniquity  of  the  times.  Soranus  had  been  pro- 

Hist.  Nat.  xxxiii.  11.,  Senee.  Epist.  27.);  3.  on  Orbitas  (comp.  Senec.  ad  Marc. 
19.  and  alib.,  Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  52.);  4.  in  the  names  Msecenatianus,  Apelles, 
Menecrates  (comp.  Suet.  Calig.  32,  Ner.  30.) ; 5.  in  tbe  estimate  of  Lucan  as  a 
poet ; 6.  in  the  verses  on  the  civil  wars ; 7.  in  the  reference  to  an  invention  for 
working  glass  with  the  hammer  (comp.  Plin.  xxxvi.  26.,  Dion,  lvii.  21.) ; 8.  in 
the  mention  of  the  Yinum  Opimianum  and  the  Horti  Pompeiani ; 9.  in  the 
reference  to  the  substitution  of  mosaic  work  for  painting,  c.  83.  (comp.  Plin. 
xxxi.  1.) ; 10.  to  the  new  fashion  of  anointing  the  feet,  c.  *70.  introduced,  ac- 
cording to  Pliny,  xiii.  3.,  under  Nero.  He  further  shows  that  the  arguments 
of  Niebuhr  and  others  for  placing  the  work  later,  L e.  in  the  time  of  the  Anto- 
nines,  the  Severi,  or  even  Constantine,  are  of  no  value,  and,  on  the  whole,  leaves 
me  tolerably  confident  that  it  belongs  to  the  age  of  Nero,  and  was  composed 
by  Petronius,  the  “Arbiter  elegantiarum”  of  that  emperor. 


166 


HISTORF  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


consul  in  Asia,  and  had  shown  unusual  consideration  for  the 
claims  of  the  subject  provincials.  But  besides  being  rebuked 
by  his  superior  goodness,  Nero  had  special  grounds  of  morti- 
fication against  him.  He  had  refused  to  punish  a city  which 
had  defended  the  statues  of  its  gods  against  the  commissioner 
sent  by  Nero  to  plunder  it.  He  was  marked  for  accusation 
by  a needy  delator.  He  was  charged  with  intimacy  with  the 
culprit  Rubellius  Plautus,  and  with  treasonable  intrigues  in 
his  province.  Against  Thrasea  the  charges  were  still  more 
vague  than  these.  This  man  was  eminent  among  the  Stoics, 
the  sect  then  most  in  vogue  among  the  Homan  nobility ; and 
even  the  stern  thoughtful  air  and  sober  garb  which  became 
his  profession,  were  felt  as  a reproach  to  the  frivolous  dissi- 
pation of  the  prince  and  his  flatterers.1  His  household  was 
regulated  with  antique  simplicity : his  wife,  the  child  of  the 
heroic  Arria,  was  wise  and  patient ; his  son-in-law,  Helvidius 
Priscus,  was  brave  and  generous;  he  was  admired  by  the 
gentle  Persius,  a philosopher  without  conceit,  and  a satirist 
without  gall.2  All  his  public  acts,  for  he  was  a senator  and 
had  held  high  office,  were  remarked  by  the  bad  with  mortifi- 
cation, by  the  good  with  undisguised  triumph.  When  the 
cruel  motion  was  made  in  the  senate  against  the  memory  of 
Agrippina,  Thrasea  had  retired  without  giving  his  vote : in 
the  Neronian  games,  when  so  many  nobles  had  disgraced 
themselves  by  unworthy  compliances,  Thrasea  had  stiffly  de- 
clined ; an  offence  the  more  pointed  because  in  the  Antenorian 
games  at  his  own  city  Patavium,  he  had  relaxed,  as  a Greek 
among  Greeks,  and  taken  part  in  the  acting  and  singing.3 
He  had  interfered  to  moderate  the  fierce  flattery  of  the  senate, 
when  it  would  have  put  Antistius  to  death  for  raillery  against 

1 Suet.  Ner.  37. : “ Thraseae  objectum  est  tristior  et  paedagogi  vultus.” 

2 The  scholiast  on  Persius  informs  us  that  the  poet  was  kinsman  to  Arria. 
Rupert,  in  Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  34.  It  is  conjectured  that  Thrasea  bel<?nged  to  the 
Gens  Fannia. 

3 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  21.:  “Parum  expectabilem  operam  praebuerat:”  “he  had 
not  done  what  was  required  of  him.”  It  has  been  explained  elsewhere  how  the 
proud  Roman  of  the  city  deigned  to  make  himself  a mere  Greek  in  the  holidays 
in  the  country. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


167 


the  emperor.  Again,  when  divine  honours  were  decreed  to 
Poppaea,  he  had  abstained  from  attending  her  obsequies.1 
Capito  Cossutianus,  the  son-in-law  of  Tigellinus,  kept  a note 
of  all  these  delinquences,  partly  from  his  own  vicious  hatred 
of  virtue , but  still  more,  perhaps,  for  the  effectual  aid  Thrasea 
had  lent  to  certain  envoys  from  Cilicia,  who  had  been  sent  to 
Rome  to  charge  him  with  oppression  in  their  province. 

Nor  was  this  all:  the  conduct  of  the  stern  republican  had 
been  marked  by  still  increasing  symptoms  of  political  disgust, 
which  could  not  fail  to  be  noticed.  His  admirers 

. . . _ _ . . Pnvolous 

m the  next  generation  related  with  a glow  ot  charges  against 
satisfaction  how  Thrasea  and  Helvidius  were 
wont  to  pledge  each  other,  crowned  with  festal  chaplets,  on 
the  birthdays  of  Brutus  and  Cassius  ;2  but  whether  this  were 
so  or  not,  the  detractors  of  his  own  day  remarked,  with  a 
shrug,  that  he  had  shunned  making  oath  to  the  emperor  at 
the  commencement  of  the  year ; that  though  a quindecemvir, 
he  had  failed  to  offer  vows  for  his  safety ; that  he  had  never 
sacrificed  for  his  health,  or  for  the  preservation  of  his  heaven- 
ly voice : once  a constant  attendant  in  the  senate-house,  he 
had  for  three  years  refrained  from  entering  it : lately  when 
the  fathers  had  rushed  to  condemn  Yetus  and  Silanus,  he  had 
pleaded  clients’  business  to  keep  away.  This,  it  was  said, 
was  secession  from  public  life;  this  was  faction:  if  many 
chose  to  do  the  same,  it  would  be  dissension,  it  would  be 
civil  war.  In  their  proneness  to  party  contentions,  people, 
it  was  muttered,  were  beginning  to  talk  forsooth  of  Nero  and 
Thrasea , as  formerly  of  Caesar  and  Cato.  Followers  he  has , 

1 That  divine  honours  were  decreed  to  Poppaea,  though  not  before  stated  by 
Tacitus,  appears  also  from  Dion,  lxiii.  26.  Her  temple  was  dedicated  by  Nero, 
inscribed  with  the  epigraph,  “ Sabinae  Deae  Veneri  matron®  fecerunt.”  Eckhel, 
Dodr.  Numm.  vi.  287.,  gives  two  coins  inscribed  on  one  side  to  “ Diva  Claudia,’’ 
the  infant  daughter,  on  the  other  to  “Diva  Poppaea  Augusta.” 

2 Juvenal,  v.  36. : — 

“ Quale  coronati  Thrasea  Helvidiusque  bibebant 
Brutorum  et  Cassi  natalibus.” 

The  respect  in  which  Thrasea  was  held  by  later  generations  is  strongly  marked 
in  the  epistles  of  the  younger  Pliny.  See  vii.  19.,  viii.  22. 


168 


HISTORY  OP  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


it  was  added,  who  affect  his  dress  and  manners , if  not  yet  the 
perverseness  of  his  opinions  ; arid  reflect  on  the  genial  laxity 
of  the  prince  by  their  sourness  and  solemnity,  j By  him  alone 
the  life  of  Caesar , his  accomplishment , his  genius , are  held  in 
no  honour.  To  believe  Poppcea  no  goddess , evinced  the  same 
evil  spirit  as  to  withhold  approval  from  the  acts  of  the  divine 
Julius  and  the  divine  Augustus.  The  journals  of  the  Senate 
were  read  in  the  provinces  and  the  camps , only  to  discover 
the  motions  which  Thrasea  refused  to  sanction.  The  sect  to 
which  he  belonged  had  been  ever  the  patron  of  a faction  ; it 
had  numbered  a Tubero  and  a Favonius , names  distasteful 
even  to  the  republic.  Such  are  the  men  who  now  set  up 
the  name  of  Liberty  as  a plea  for  overthrowing  the  empire: 
should  they  succeed  in  overthrowing  it , they  will  soon  attack 
liberty  itself. These  insinuations  easily  in- 

flamed the  fury  of  Nero,  and  he  encouraged  Capito  to  pro- 
ceed with  his  impeachment  with  the  aid  of  another  vehement 
delator,  Eprius  Marcellus.1 

The  reader  will  have  remarked  that  hitherto  the  victims 
of  Nero  had  almost  all  perished  in  private.  Either  he  had 
made  use  of  secret  assassination,  or  threats  alone  had  sufficed 
to  drive  his  enemies  to  suicide  in  the  recesses  of  their  own 
houses.  Slowly,  and  from  confused  and  doubtful  whisper- 
ings, had  the  people  learnt  for  the  most  part  the  fate  of 
Agrippina  and  Britannicus,  of  Octavia,  Cassius,  and  Silanus. 
Such  deeds  were  not  exhibited  in  public,  such  records  were 
not  written  in  contemporary  history.  The  sensibility  of  that 
excitable  populace  was  little  affected  by  mutterings  of  hor- 
rors removed  actually  from  their  sight,  or  softened  to  their 
imaginations  by  the  lapse  of  time.  This  was  no  doubt  the 
secret  of  Nero’s  policy,  which  enabled  him  to  break  all  his 
pledges  to  justice  and  humanity,  and  gave  impunity  to  crimes 
which  posterity  has  so  deservedly  execrated.  But  in  the 
cases  now  before  us,  the  threats  of  the  accusers  seemed  to  be 
of  no  avail,  and  the  emperor  was  prevailed  on  to  consent,  not 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xvi  22. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


169 


without  apprehension,  to  the  course  of  a public  prosecution. 
A moment  was  adroitly  seized  to  carry  through  the  process 
when  attention  was  absorbed  in  a matter  of  casual  interest. 
Tiridates,  a claimant  to  the  throne  of  Armenia,  came  to  Rome 
to  receive  the  diadem  from  the  hand  of  the  emperor.  To 
dispose  of  foreign  crowns  was  the  pride  of  the  senate  and  its 
chiefs,  and  here  a rival  potentate  was  stooping  to  receive  the 
gift.  Nero,  with  no  conquests  of  his  own  to  boast  of,  was 
eager  to  make  a grand  display  of  his  dignity  and  power.1 
The  citizens,  with  their  increasing  frivolity  and  love  for 
shows  and  ceremonies,  were  gloating  over  the  meeting  of  the 
prince  and  the  king,  when  Thrasea  and  Soranus  were  both 
suddenly  denounced.  Thrasea  desired  an  interview  with  the 
emperor : this  being  refused,  he  addressed  him  by  letter,  pledg- 
ing himself  to  refute  every  accusation,  and  requiring  only 
to  be  confronted  with  his  accuser.  Nero  had  eagerly  seized 
the  paper  in  which  he  hoped  to  read  an  avowal  of  guilt,  ac- 
companied with  an  abject  submission.  Disappointed  in  this 
anticipation,  he  resolved  with  mortified  vanity  to  let  the  im- 
peachment proceed,  and  summoned  the  senate  to  hear  and 
pronounce  upon  it. 

On  the  circumstances  of  this  illustrious  sacrifice  Tacitus 
dwells  with  peculiar  solemnity.  He  sets  before  us,  as  in  a 
discussion  of  the  friends  of  Thrasea,  the  argu- 

' o Thrfl,sftA  (Jis- 

ments  which  were  doubtless  often  in  the  mouths  cussm  with  his 
of  the  sufferers  of  those  days  and  their  anxious  course  he 
associates,  for  defying  the  delator  with  a bold 
though  hopeless  defence,  or  for  submitting  in  silence  to  the 
inevitable  sentence.  On  the  one  hand,  those  who  urged  the 

1 Suetonius,  Ner.  13.,  describes  the  ceremony.  Nero  wore  triumphal  robes, 
surrounded  by  troops,  and  the  whole  solemnity  bore  a military  character.  At 
the  close  the  soldiers  saluted  him  with  the  title  of  Imperator,  and  his  laurels 
were  offered  to  Jupiter  in  the  Capitol.  This  presumed  victory  was  followed  by 
the  closing  of  the  temple  of  Janus.  Comp,  the  medals  on  which  the  closing  of 
Janus  is  recorded,  as  given  by  Eckhel,  vi.  273.,  which  must  overrule  the  conflict- 
ing statement  of  Orosius,  though  professing  to  be  taken  from  Tacitus,  that 
Janus  was  never  closed  between  Augustus  and  Vespasian. — Oros.  vii.  3. 


170 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


accused  to  present  himself  in  the  senate-house  declared  their 
conviction  that  his  constancy  would  not  fail  him  ; he  would 

say  nothing  hut  what  would  enhance  his  reputation 

Let  the  citizens  behold  him  confronting  the  terrors  of  death  : 
let  the  fathers  hear  his  words , the  words  of  a god  rather  than 
of  a man : possibly  even  Nero  himself  might  be  moved  by  the 
eloquence  of  inspiration : at  least , should  he  persist  in  his 
cruelty , posterity  would  distinguish  this  example  of  a worthy 
death  from  the  cowardice  of  those  who  let  themselves  perish 

in  silence On  the  other  hand,  some  advised  him 

to  await  the  event  in  his  own  chamber.  To  his  virtue  and 
constancy  they  paid  the  same  tribute  as  the  first  speakers ; 
hut  they  warned  him  of  the  insults  he  might  have  to  undergo ; 
the  railing  of  his  accusers  might  he  followed  by  the  revilings, 

and  even  the  blows,  of  the  servile  crowd  around  them 

Let  him  relieve  the  senate  from  the  infamy  of  such  a crime ; 
let  him  leave  it  undetermined  what  the  fathers  would  venture 
to  decree  against  Thrasea  at  their  bar.  That  Nero  would 
be  made  to  blush  there  was  no  hope  whatever ; but  defiance 
might  goad  him  to  further  cruelties  against  his  victim’s  chil- 
dren. But  the  counsels  of  the  anxious  band  were  not  solely 
confined  to  considerations  of  dignity  or  expediency.  One  at 
least  among  them,  the  young  Arulenus  Rusticus,  offered  at 
all  risks  to  intercede,  as  tribune  of  the  people,  and  exercise 
the  ancient  right  of  his  office  to  quash  the  decree  of  the 
senate.  He  was  only  restrained  by  the  mild  prudence  of 
Thrasea  himself,  who  pronounced  that  now,  on  the  threshold 
of  a public  career,  it  was  his  duty  not  to  throw  away  his  life 
to  no  purpose,  but  reserve  it  for  the  chance  of  future  useful- 
ness.1 

Every  suggestion  invited  and  affably  considered,  the  sage 
withdrew  to  make  his  final  determination  in  private.  Mean- 
while, the  proceedings  of  his  enemies-  were  car- 

Proceedings  . . r ° 

against  him  in  ned  on  impetuously.  The  next  morning  two  prae- 
torian cohorts  occupied  the  temple  of  Venus 
Genitrie,  whither  the  senate  was  summoned.  The  ap- 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  25,  26. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


171 


proaches  were  thronged  by  bands  of  gowned  citizens,  sword 
in  hand,  while  soldiers  were  posted  in  the  forums  and  halls 
around ; it  was  amidst  the  scowls  and  threats  of  these  terri- 
ble bystanders  that  the  fathers  entered  the  Curia.  A mes- 
sage from  the  emperor  was  delivered.  It  contained  a gen- 
eral complaint  against  the  senators  for  deserting  their  posts, 
and  preferring  the  ease  of  their  suburban  pleasances  to  the 
fatigues  of  public  duty.  This  was  the  theme  on  which  the 
accusers  spoke.  Thrasea  and  Helvidius  in  the  first  instance, 
next  to  them  Paconius  Agrippinus  and  Curtius  Montanus,  as 
known  objects  of  the  prince’s  jealousy,  were  charged  with 
this  dereliction  of  their  senatorial  duties,  ascribed  to  a con- 
tumacious and  treasonable  disgust  towards  the  government. 
To  Thrasea,  it  was  asserted,  the  peace  of  the  world,  and  the 
victories  of  the  empire,  were  equally  distasteful.  The  forums, 
the  temples,  the  theatres,  wherever,  in  short,  the  Roman  peo- 
ple congregated  most  for  duties  or  amusements,  he  shunned 
alike,  as  though  they  were  solitudes  uninhabitable  to  man. 
He  had  snapped  the  social  bonds  of  rank  and  profession  ; he 
had  abandoned  the  Roman  commonwealth ; let  him  die  the 
death,  and  make  the  unholy  divorce  final  and  complete. 

The  declamation  of  Marcellus  was  loud  and  passionate  ; 
and  the  senate,  terrified  beyond  its  wont  by  the  threatening 
sights  around  it,  succumbed  impotently  to  its  charges  against 
fury.  Nevertheless,  so  deep  was  the  compassion  SoraQUS- 
for  the  blameless  virtue  of  Thrasea,  the  gallant  bravery  of 
Helvidius,  the  guileless  innocence  of  Agrippinus  and  Mon- 
tanus, that  when  the  harangue  of  the  accuser  ended,  it  still 
sate  motionless  and  silent.  Then  uprose  Sabinus  to  advance 
his  charges  against  Soranus,  and  with  the  treasons  he  imput- 
ed to  the  father  he  combined  a charge  of  unholy  divination 
against  his  young  and  widowed  daughter.  Servilia,  such  was 
the  matron’s  name,  admitted  that  she  had  consulted  the  sor- 
cerers as  to  the  fate  impending  on  her  sire  ; but  she  had  con- 
ceived no  imprecations  on  the  prince ; for  his  safety  she  had 
always  prayed ; in  the  ardour  of  her  feminine  devotion  she 
had  ever  mentioned  his  name  among  the  gods  whom  she  in- 


172 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


yoked.  Soranus  avouched  her  innocence  with  passionate  ex- 
clamations : with  his  acts,  whatever  their  colour  might  he, 
he  showed  that  she  was*  in  no  way  connected.  But  the 
charges  against  both  were  pressed  with  redoubled  vehemence. 
Among  the  most  conspicuous  of  the  witnesses  against  Sora- 
nus was  Egnatius,  his  client  and  the  professed  imitator  of  his 
conduct  and  opinions.  The  senate  was  moved  with  more 
than  common  disgust  at  the  sight  of  a man  who  professed 
himself  among  the  straitest  of  the  Stoics,  denouncing  the 
noblest  model  of  his  own  sect.1 

The  accusers,  however,  were  completely  successful.  After 
a short  pause,  which  gave  room  for  one  example  of  generous 
Death  of  Thra-  devotion  in  the  person  of  Cassius  Asclepiodotus, 
6ea-  a foreigner,  once  the  client  and  now  the  defender 

of  Soranus,  the  senate  decreed  death,  allowing  only  the 
choice  of  death  to  themselves,  against  Thrasea,  Soranus,  and 
Servilia.  Helvidius  and  Paconius  were  to  be  banished  from 
Italy.  Mont  anus  was  only  declared  incapable  of  all  public 
functions  as  a citizen.  Marcellus  and  Cossutianus,  on  the 
other  hand,  were  rewarded  with  largesses  and  honours.  The 
whole  day  had  been  consumed  in  this  double  process.  It  was 
already  evening  when  the  quaestor  of  the  consul  arrived  with 
the  fatal  intelligence  before  the  door  of  Thrasea,  who,  it 
seems,  had  remained  quietly  at  home,  and  was  entertaining 
a number  of  distinguished  friends,  both  male  and  female.  He 
was  engaged  more  particularly  in  a discourse  with  the  Cynic 
Demetrius,  and  from  the  solemnity  of  his  gestures  as  well  as 
from'  words  which  were  overheard  from  him,  it  was  supposed 
that  the  topic  of  their  discussion  was  the  nature  of  the  soul, 
and  the  independence  of  mind  and  body.  Amidst  the  tears 
and  groans  of  the  company,  to  whom  the  message  was  quick- 
ly communicated,  Thrasea  contented  himself  with  urging 
them  not  to  incur  danger  on  his  behalf,  and  forbade  his  wife  to 
follow  the  example  of  the  elder  Arria,  bidding  her  live  for  the 

1 The  crime  of  Egnatius  furnished  a standing  example  of  unnatural  perfidy 
to  the  satirists.  “Stoicus  occidit  Baream,  delator  amicum.”  Juv.  Sai.  iiL 
116. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


173 


last  solace  and  protection  of  their  only  daughter.  Then  go- 
ing forth,  he  met  the  messenger  of  death,  and  received  from 
his  hands  the  decree  of  the  senate.  He  rejoiced  to  find  that 
Helvidius  was  spared.  Taking  the  young  man,  together 
with  Demetrius,  into  his  chamber,  he  held  out  his  arms  to  the 
operator,  and  dashing  on  the  ground  the  first  blood  that  start- 
ed, A libation , he  exclaimed,  to  Jove  the  Deliver!  Look, 
young  man , he  added,  and  heaven  avert  the  omen  ! but  in 
the  age  to  which  you  are  born , it  behoves  men  to  confirm  their 
own  courage  by  beholding  fortitude  in  others,1  And  here, — 
with  only  the  addition  that  his  pains  were  long,  and  that  he 
turned  towards  Demetrius, — the  last  sentence  of  the  histo- 
rian is  suddenly  interrupted  : our  manuscripts  of  this  part  of 
Tacitus  have  come  to  us  from  a single  copy,  and  the  chance 
which  has  torn  off  some  few  leaves,  perhaps,  from  the  end  of 
a volume,  has  broken  the  thread  of  a narrative,  so  painfully 
interesting,  so  solemnly  instructive.  The  interest  is  common 
to  all  mankind  who  can  sympathize  in  the  sorrows  and  vir- 
tues of  the  noblest  of  their  species : the  instruction  is  for 
those  who  can  gather  from  these  agonizing  details  the  warn- 
ings or  consolations  they  are  fitted  to  impart.  In  the  follow- 
ing chapter  we  shall  enter  upon  an  examination  of  the  state 
of  thought  and  sentiment  at  Rome  at  this  period,  which  may 
help  us,  perhaps,  to  unriddle  some  of  the  perplexing  ques- 
tions which  have  been  opened  but  not  solved  for  us  in  the 
narrative  of  the  historians. 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  ult. 


174 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


CHAPTER  LIT. 

CONSIDERATION'  OF  THE  CAUSES  "WHICH  INDUCED  THE  ROMANS  TO  ENDURE  THE 
TYRANNY  OF  THE  EMPERORS. — FREEDOM  OF  THOUGHT  AND  EDUCATION  ALLOWED 
BY  IT  ACCEPTED  AS  A COMPENSATION  FOR  RESTRAINTS  ON  POLITICAL  ACTION. — 
TOLERATION  OF  PHILOSOPHY. — OPPOSITION  OF  THE  STOICS  TO  THE  GOVERNMENT  *. 

THEIR  CHARACTER  AND  POSITION  IN  THE  COMMONWEALTH. STATE  OF  RELIGION 

AT  ROME:  SUPPRESSION  OF  THE  GAULISH  SUPERSTITIONS:  ENCROACHMENT  OF 
ORIENTAL  CULTS. — PROSCRIPTION  OF  THE  SYRIAN  AND  EGYPTIAN  PRIESTHOODS. — 
JUDAISM  BECOMES  FASHIONABLE  AT  ROME  : INTRODUCED  AMONG  THE  FP.EEDMEN 
OF  THE  PALACE. — TURBULENCE  AND  PROSCRIPTION  OF  THE  JEWS  AT  ROME. — 
FIRST  RECEPTION  OF  CHRISTIAN  IDEAS  AMONG  THEM. — ST.  J*AUL’s  EPISTLE  TO  THE 
ROMANS. — HIS  ARRIVAL  AND  PREACHING  AT  ROME — PERSECUTION  OF  THE 

“ CHRISTIANS.” QUESTION  OF  THE  APPLICATION  OF  THIS  NAME  BY  TACITUS. 

THE  TYRANNY  OF  THE  EMPERORS  SUPPORTED  BY  THE  CORRUPTION  OF  THE  AGE 

REFLECTIONS  ON  ROMAN  VICE — COUNTERACTING  PRINCIPLES  OF  VIRTUE. — CHRIS- 
TIANITY ACCORDS  WITH  THE  MORAL  TENDENCIES  OF  THE  AGE — SENECA  AND  SAINT 
PAUL. — THE  TEACHING  OF  SENECA  MORAL,  NOT  POLITICAL. — PERSIUS  AND  LUCAN. 

THE  tyranny  of  Nero,  and  with  it  the  tyranny  of  the 
Roman  emperors, — that  tyranny  which  has  been  held 
up  as  a warning  beacon  to  freemen  for  so  many 

Characteristics  1r'.l  ° . ..  . , 

of  the  imperial  hundred  years, — has  now  reached  its  climax : wnth 
Thrasea  not  a virtuous  man,  but  Virtue  itself,  in 
the  affected  phrase  of  Tacitus,  may  seem  to  have  been  pro- 
scribed. Surveyed  from  a great  distance  in  time  and  place, 
and  from  our  point  of  view,  unfamiliar  as  we  happily  are 
with  the  circumstances  attending  them,  such  atrocities  as 
those  recorded  in  our  latter  chapters  seem  to  border  on  the 
incredible.  It  is  not  so  much  the  barbarity  of  the  despot, — 
released  from  all  fear  of  God  and  overwhelmed  at  the  same 
time  with  the  fear  of  man, — as  the  patience  of  the  subjects, 
that  moves  our  wonder,  and  appears  at  first  sight  among  the 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


175 


most  inscrutable  problems  of  history.  Every  Roman  was 
armed,  and  the  military  force  at  the  prince’s  hand  was  of  the 
most  trifling  description ; every  Roman  vaunted  himself  of 
the  same  ruling  race  as  the  prince  ; his  equal  in  intelligence, 
in  theory  at  least  his  equal  before  the  law.  The  emperor  of 
the  Romans  stood  absolutely  alone  at  the  head  of  his  people. 
He  had  no  society  of  tyrants  of  his  own  class,  like  the  slave- 
owner, to  support  him : he  had  no  foreign  allies,  like  an  auto- 
crat in  modem  Europe,  to  maintain  his  authority  as  a bul- 
wark to  their  own.  Yet  the  attempts  against  the  life  or 
power  of  the  Caesars  have  been,  as  far  as  we  have  seen,  com- 
paratively few.  They  have  generally  been  the  work  of  pri- 
vate enemies  or  domestic  traitors : those  which  have  been 
contrived  by  public  men,  and  for  public  ends,  whether  suc- 
cessful or  not,  have  conciliated  no  sympathy  from  the  multi- 
tude. To  throw  any  light  on  this  phenomenon,  for  such  it 
may  deserve  to  be  called,  we  must  look  more  deeply  into  the 
circumstances  of  the  times,  and  the  moral  condition  of  the 
Roman  world. 

Of  the  enormities  of  Xero  more  particularly  it  has  been 
already  observed,  but  it  may  be  well  to  repeat  and  enforce 
the  observation,  that  they  were  comparatively  unknown  to 
the  mass  of  the  citizens.  Some  years  of  sincere  benevolence 
and  virtue,  some  more  of  discreet  and  thoughtful 

. __  Its  acts  were 

vigilance,  had  disposed  the  subjects  of  iSeroto  generally 

, . , i i shroudedin 

cherish  a kindly  ieeling  towards  their  ruler,  and  comparative 
to  reject  as  querulous  declamation  the  vague  and  pnvaC7, 
unproved  charges  of  tyranny  which  they  might  sometimes 
hear  made  against  him.  To  some  crimes,  real  and  manifest, 
they  suffered  themselves  to  be  blinded.  The  Quinquennium 
of  Xero  could  not  be  effaced  at  once  from  their  memories. 
The  remembrance  of  it  has  been  among  the  most  lasting  mon- 
uments  of  the  proneness  of  the  Romans, — shall  we  not  say 
of  mankind  in  general  ? — to  canonize  the  virtues  of  the  great 
rather  than  to  execrate  their  vices.  TV e have  seen,  moreover, 
that  the  victims  of  Xero,  unlike  those  of  Caius  or  Tiberius, 
perished  generally  with  closed  doors.  Though  their  crimes, 


176 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


their  sentences,  and  the  manner  of  their  deaths  were  discuss- 
ed in  the  senate  and  recorded  in  the  public  archives,  they 
were  withdrawn  at  least  from  the  public  eye,  and  the  story 
of  their  sufferings,  when  it  reached  at  last  the  ears  of  the 
citizens,  was  less  moving  than  if  they  had  been  witnessed  in 
the  open  day.  We  must  not  judge  too  harshly  of  the  shrink- 
ing from  public  exposure,  or  the  hope  of  securing  indulgence 
for  a surviving  family,  which  induced  so  many  of  the  accused 
to  anticipate  the  centurion’s  sword  by  suicide : yet  the  prac- 
tice was  not  less  really  a crime  against  society ; it  riveted 
more  strongly  the  tyranny  of  the  despot,  who  might  smile  at 
being  thus  relieved  from  a portion  of  the  odium  due  to  him. 
Both  Thrasea  and  Cato  fell  short  of  the  dignity  of  suffering, 
the  last  and  noblest  lesson  it  was  given  them  to  teach.  We 
must  not  wonder  that  the  people  showed  little  sympathy 
with  the  men  who  waived  a dying  appeal  to  their  feelings,  to 
their  self-respect,  to  their  love.  They  chose  to  die  the  death 
of  slaves,  when  they  might  have  approved  themselves  as 
martyrs,  and  it  was  as  slaves  rather  than  martyrs  that  they 
came  to  be  regarded.1 

But  the  Romans,  it  may  be  added,  had  they  been  more 
conscious  of  the  cruelties  thus  perpetrated  in  the  midst  of 
The  idea  of  them, — had  they  felt  more  keenly  the  pain  and 

Srto^L^Eo-  shame  of  the  victims  of  the  tyranny  which  over- 
mans.  shadowed  them, — would  still  have  borne  it  with 

an  apathy  which  it  requires  some  effort  to  understand.  For 
they  were  hardened  against  the  sense  of  wrong  and  suffering 
by  the  viciousness  of  their  own  institutions,  by  their  own  per- 
sonal habits  and  usages,  by  the  daily  practice  of  every  house- 

1 Several  passages  of  contemporary  writers  express  some  bitterness  at  the 
desperation  with  which  the  best  men  threw  away  their  lives.  Thus  Tacitus 
praises  Agricola  ( Agric.  c.  42.) : “ Quia  non  contumacia  neque  inani  jactatione 
libertatis  famam  fatiimque  provocabat  ....  sciant  obsequium  ac  modestiam, 
si  industria  ac  vigor  adsint,  eo  laudis  excedere  quod  plerique  per  abrupta,  sed 
in  nullum  reipublicae  usum,  ambitiosa  morte  inclaruerunt.”  Comp.  Ann.  iv. 
20. ; and  Martial,  i.  9. : 

“ Nolo  virum  facili  redimit  qui  sanguine  famam ; 

Hunc  volo  laudari  qui  sine  morte  potest.” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE.  177 

hold  among  them.  Whenever  the  Roman  entered  his  own 
dwelling,  the  slave  chained  in  the  doorway,  the  thongs  hang- 
ing from  the  stairs,  the  marks  of  the  iron  and  the  cord  on 
the  faces  of  his  domestics,  all  impressed  him  with  the  feeling 
that  he  was  a despot  himself ; for  despot  and  master  were 
only  other  words  for  the  same  fearful  thing,  the  irresponsible 
owner  of  a horde  of  human  chattels.1  When  he  seated  him- 
self in  the  circus,  and  beheld  the  combats  of  men  with 
beasts,  or  of  men  with  their  fellow-men, — when  he  smelt  the 
reeking  fumes  of  blood  which  saffron  odours  could  not  allay, 
heard  the  groans  of  the  wounded,  and,  appealed  to  with  the 
last  look  of  despair,  gave  ruthlessly  the  sign  for  slaughter, — 
he  could  not  but  be  conscious  of  the  same  glow  of  pleasur- 
able excitement  at  the  sight  of  death  and  torture  which  is 
ascribed  to  the  most  ferocious  of  tyrants.  Again,  when  he 
invaded  a province  as  quaestor  or  proconsul,  and  set  himself 
to  amass  a fortune  without  regard  to  duty  or  humanity,  he 
felt,  not  without  pride,  that  if  among  citizens  he  was  a citi- 
zen, he  was  himself  a king  or  an  emperor  among  the  subjects 
of  the  state.  His  own  conscience  would  not  suffer  him  to  be 
indignant  at  any  tyranny  he  witnessed.  He  had  done  as  much 
or  more  himself.  Tyranny  was  his  own  birthright:  how 
could  he  resent  its  exercise  in  another  ? unless  it  immediately 
touched  himself,  what  interest  had  he  in  resenting  it  ? And 
for  all  the  iniquities  he  himself  practised,  he  had  no  doubt  a 
salvo  in  his  own  breast.  Slavery  he  firmly  believed  to  be  an 
eternal  law  of  Nature.  The  free  races  were,  he  was  assured, 
as  gods  to  the  servile  races.  He  confessed  the  more  readily, 
perhaps,  that  Caesar  was  in  some  sense  divine,  inasmuch  as 
he  claimed  to  be  himself  of  superior  nature  to  the  prostrate 
herds  at  his  feet.  But  if  Caesar  was  divine,  must  he  not  ac- 
quiesce in  Caesar’s  sovereign  authority  ? 2 An  old  state  tra- 

1 The  frightful  stories  of  Vedius  Pollio  (Dion,  liv.  23.),  and  Pedanius  (Tac. 
Ann.  xiv.  42.), — with  which  compare  that  of  Largius  Macedo  (Plin.  Epist.  iii. 
14.), — may  suffice  to  show  that  the  Roman  masters  were  supported  by  the  law 
in  greater  cruelties  than  any  the  Emperors  practiced  in  defiance  of  it. 

2 If  some  were  still  inconsistent  enough  to  complain  of  the  loss  of  liberty, 

VOL.  vi. — 12 


178 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


dition  pronounced  that  the  massacres  of  the  circus  were  po- 
litically expedient.  That  men  should  he  hardened  against 
fear  by  the  frequent  spectacle  of  death  was  a fixed  principle 
in  the  moral  creed  of  the  Roman.  Lastly,  that  Rome  should 
rule  the  world  seemed  to  him  the  final  cause  of  creation.1  He 
was  not  generally  troubled  by  any  slur  thus  cast  upon  Prov- 
idence, as  harsh  and  partial.  He  never  thought  of  the  moral 
government  of  the  world  as  a system  of  mysterious  wisdom 
and  mercy,  and  it  was  no  part  of  his  philosophy  to  reconcile 
the  jarring  facts  around  him  with  the  disposition  of  the  Al- 
mighty Power  to  whom  he  gave  the  name  of  Best  as  well  as 
of  Greatest. 

The  ordinary  notion  of  absolute  government,  derived 
from  the  form  it  assumes  in  Europe  at  the  present  day,  is 
that  of  a strict  system  of  prevention,  which,  by 

The  Roman  po-  J r ’. 

Dee  repressive,  means  ot  a powerlul  army,  an  ubiquitous  police, 

not  preventive.  . . _ . J 

and  a censorship  oi  letters,  anticipates  every 
manifestation  of  freedom  in  thought  or  action,  from  whence 
inconvenience  may  arise  to  it.  But  this  was  not  the  system 
of  the  Caesarean  Empire.  Faithful  to  the  traditions  of  the 
Free  State,  Augustus  had  quartered  all  his  armies  on  the 
frontiers,  and  his  successors  were  content  with  concentrating, 
cohort  by  cohort,  a small  though  trusty  force  for  their  own 
protection  in  the  capital.  The  legions  were  useful  to  the 
emperor,  not  as  instruments  for  the  repression  of  discontent 
at  home,  but  as  faithful  auxiliaries  among  whom  the  most 
dangerous  of  his  nobles  might  be  relegated,  in  posts  which 

Seneca  could  thus  justly  rebuke  them : “ Respondisse  tibi  servum  indignasis, 
libertumque  et  uxorem  et  clientem ; deinde  de  republica  libertatem  sublatam 
quereris,  quam  domi  sustulisti.” — Senec.  De  Ira,  hi.  35. 

1 In  such  a case  the  evidence  of  a popular  poet  is  worth  more  than  that  of 
a philosopher.  Statius  expounds  the  universal  law  of  tyranny  boldly  and 
plainly,  Sylv.  in.  3.  49. : 

“ Vice  cuncta  reguntur 

Alternisque  regunt : propriis  sub  regibus  omnis 
Terra;  premit  felix  regum  diademata  Roma. 

Hanc  ducibus  fraenare  datum ; mox  crescit  in  illos 
Imperium  Superis : sed  habent  et  Numina  legem.” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


179 


were  really  no  more  than  honourable  exiles.  Nor  was  the 
regular  police  of  the  city  an  engine  of  tyranny.  Volunteers 
might  be  found  in  every  rank  to  perform  the  duty  of  spies ; 
but  it  was  apparently  no  part  of  the  functions  of  the  guar- 
dians of  the  streets  to  watch  the  countenances  of  the  citi- 
zens^ or  beset  their  privacy.  We  hear  of  no  intrusion  into 
private  assemblies,  no  dispersion  of  crowds  in  the  streets.  It 
was  generally  deemed  sufficient  to  divert  the  interest  of  the 
people  from  public  affairs  by  supplying  them  with  a constant 
variety  of  employment  or  dissipation,  to  amuse  them,  in  their 
casual  bursts  of  anger,  by  the  sacrifice  of  some  object  of  their 
aversion,  to  soothe  their  discontent  by  redoubled  largesses,  to 
allay  their  alarms  of  plague  or  famine  by  more  extravagant 
shows  and  massacres  in  the  circus.  Or  if  at  any  time  their 
murmurs  took  shape  in  action,  or  secret  conspiracies  against 
the  government  were  detected,  the  arm  of  the  emperor  de- 
scended upon  them  swiftly  and  ruthlessly,  and  the  severity  of 
the  punishment  stunned  and  laid  them  in  the  dust. 

Conscious  of  their  power  to  repress  disaffection,  it  was 
not  therefore  the  policy  of  the  emperors  ostentatiously  to 
prevent  it.  For  this  reason  we  find  that  they 

r . . J Freedom  of 

made  no  eflort  to  impose  restraints  upon  thought,  thought  among 

_ . -i-i-i-,.  the  Romans. 

r reedom  oi  thought  may  be  checked  m two  ways, 
and  modern  despotism  resorts  in  its  restless  jealousy  to  both. 
The  one  is,  to  guide  ideas  by  seizing  on  the  channels  of  edu- 
cation; the  other,  to  subject  their  utterance  to  the  control  of 
a censorship.  In  neither  one  way  nor  the  other  did  Augustus 
or  Nero  interfere  at  all.  From  the  days  of  the  republic  the 
system  of  education  had  been  perfectly  untrammeled.  It 
was  simply  a matter  of  arrangement  between  the  parties  di- 
rectly interested,  the  teacher  and  the  learner.  Neither  state 
nor  church  pretended  to  take  any  concern  in  it : 

. . J System  of  edu- 

neither  priest  nor  magistrate  regarded  it  with  the  cation  inde- 
slightest  jealousy.  Public  opinion  ranged,  under  priests  or  mag- 
ordinary  circumstances,  in  perfect  freedom,  and  13  ” eS' 
under  its  unchecked  influence  both  the  aims  and  methods  of 
education  continued  long  to  be  admirably  adapted  to  make 


180 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


intelligent  men  and  useful  citizens.  The  end  of  the  highest 
education  among  the  Romans  was  to  fit  a man  for  the  dis- 
charge of  his  public  duties.  But,  in  theory  at  least,  they 
took  a very  liberal  view  of  public  duty,  and  conceived  that 
every  thing  which  refined  and  enlarged  his  intellectual  pow- 
ers made  him  a wiser  legislator  and  an  abler  magistrate.  At 
the  age  of  seven,  or  sometimes  a few  years  later,  the  child 
began  his  course  of  public  instruction  on  the  benches  of  the 
Grammarian.  From  him  he  learned  to  read  and  speak  his 
own  language  step  by  step  with  the  Greek,  and  imbued  his 
memory  with  the  thoughts  and  language  of  the  classics  of 
either  tongue,  from  Homer  to  Ennius  or  Virgil.  At  fourteen, 
or  as  soon  as  the  powers  of  thought  began  to  unfold  them- 
selves, he  was  transferred  to  the  school  of  the  Rhetorician, 
where  he  first  began  to  concentrate  his  studies  upon  the  fu- 
ture business  of  his  life.  He  was  to  be  made  a public  man, 
and  therefore  above  all  things  a public  speaker.  He  was  to 
be  trained  for  a perfect  orator,  by  declamation,  by  writing,  by 
careful  study  of  the  best  models,  by  constant  exercise  in  ri- 
valry with  his  schoolfellows.  But  it  was  not  the  mere  trick 
of  action,  or  knack  of  speaking,  that  he  was  to  acquire : he 
was  to  be  thoroughly  informed  with  the  matter  requisite  for 
his  calling.  Every  branch  of  knowledge  might  sometimes  have 
its  application : every  art  and  science  might  serve  on  occasion 
to  illustrate  the  topics  presented  to  him  for  discussion : and,  if 
any  were  too  remote  from  the  sphere  of  forensic  eloquence, 
they  would  serve  at  least  to  expand  the  mind  of  the  pupil, 
its  extent  and  1°  give  breadth  and  depth  and  height  to  his  un- 
liberaiity.  derstanding.  Among  these  sciences,  however, 
there  was  one  which  held  the  highest  place,  one  which  for  its 
pre-eminence  among  them  deserved  to  be  removed  from  the 
circle  of  the  rhetorician’s  instructions,  and  entrusted  to  the 
care  of  a special  teacher.  At  seventeen,  or  when  the  fated 
struggle  begins  between  the  moral  principles  and  the  instincts 
of  appetite, — at  the  commencement,  such  as  morality  and  re- 
ligion have  represented  it,  of  the  great  battle  of  life  between 
vice  and  virtue, — the  youth  was  transferred  to  the  academy 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


181 


of  the  Philosopher  or  Sophist,  to  learn  the  mysteries  of  the 
Good,  the  Fair,  and  the  Honourable.1  While  he  still  contin- 
ued to  exercise  himself  daily  in  rhetorical  studies  and  prac- 
tice, he  explored  the  dark  by-ways  of  morals  and  metaphysics 
under  accomplished  teachers,  and  traversed  perhaps  the  whole 
circuit  of  Grecian  speculation  before  he  determined  in  which 
sect  definitively  to  enrol  himself. 

Such  a course  of  education,  it  must  be  allowed,  was  nobly 
conceived ; and  at  the  hands  of  the  Romans  it  received  fair 
play ; for  it  was  warped  by  no  sectarian  prejudices,  nor  con- 
fined by  narrow  notions  of  state  policy.  At  first,  indeed,  the 
government  looked  with  distrust  on  the  new  science  of  the 
rhetoricians,  and  the  strange  doctrines  of  the  sophists  from 
beyond  the  sea:  the  stern  republic  of  Cato  suspected  the 
tendencies  of  a learning  imported  by  the  effeminate  parasites 
of  conquered  Greece,  But  even  these  camp-prej-  High  training 
udices  were  transient,  and  in  the  later  times  of  RoSe^der 
the  Free  State  the  intellect  of  the  Roman  youth  the  Free  state- 
was  allowed  to  be  developed  without  restraint,  and  undoubt- 
edly with  no  common  success.  The  Roman  men  of  affairs 
were  generally  men  of  well-trained  understandings.  Their 
soldiers  could  speak  and  write  as  well  as  command.  Their 
knowledge  of  ideas  and  letters  was  wide  in  its  range,  though 
perhaps  their  views  had  little  depth,  and  still  less  originality. 
But  there  is  something  very  remarkable  in  the  ease  with 
which  they  could  turn  from  the  active  to  the  literary  life, 
from  study  to  composition,  from  speaking  to  speculation. 
With  the  fall  of  freedom  the  sphere  of  eloquence  became  lam- 
entably restricted,  and  oratory  degenerated  into  mere  dec- 
lamation: the  subjects  to  which  the  learner  was  directed 
were  frivolous,  and  the  nature  of  his  preparation  in  art  was 
no  doubt  less  discursive  and  complete.2  Never- 

. _ . , , . „ Not  materially 

tneless,  even  under  the  empire,  the  education  ot  lowered  under 
youth  bore  honourable  fruit.  It  created  men  of  ne  emp 

1 Thus  Persius,  at  twelve  years,  entered  the  school  of  the  grammarian  Par 
lsemon ; thence  he  went  to  the  rhetor  Virginius ; and  finally,  at  sixteen,  to  the 
philosopher  Comutus. — Suet.  ml.  Pers. 

2 For  the  subjects  of  declamation  compare  what  has  been  said  in  chap.  xli. ; 


182 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


letters  if  not  practical  statesmen ; it  sharpened  the  intellect, 
formed  habits  of  industry,  enlivened  thought,  and  fostered  a 
variety  of  interests,  and  an  aptitude  for  manifold  pursuits. 
It  continued  as  before  to  be  exercised  with  perfect  freedom. 
The  most  jealous  of  the  Caesars  made  no  attempt  to  control 
it,  to  dictate  its  subjects  and  prescribe  its  methods.  Its  text- 
books were  still,  as  ever,  the  most  famous  compositions  of  re- 
Deciamation  in  publican  Greece ; the  favourite  topics  of  its  dec- 
ertySan°d  tyran-  lamations  were  the  glories  and  virtues  of  the 
nicide.  freemen  of  antiquity,  and  the  praise  of  tyranni- 

cide resounded  from  all  its  benches.1  Even  the  milder  method 
of  guiding  education,  by  enlisting  salaried  professors  in  the 
interest  of  the  government,  was  not  discovered  till  a later 
period ; even  then  we  shall  find  reason  to  question  whether 
it  was  adopted  as  a precaution  of  state  policy,  or  rather  as  a 
cheap  subordination  of  flattery. 

The  same  indulgence  which  was  extended  to  education 
smiled  upon  the  literature  which  flowed  so  copiously  from  it. 

There  was  no  restriction  on  writing  or  publica- 

No  restrictions  . ° - 

on  freedom  of  tion  at  Rome  analogous  to  our  censorships  and 
licensing  acts.  The  fact  that  books  were  copied 
by  the  hand,  and  not  printed  for  general  circulation,  seems  to 

and  see  Tacitus,  Dial,  de  Oral.  35. : “ Sequitur  ut  materiae  abhorrenti  a veri- 
tate  declamatio  quoque  adhibeatur.  "Sic  fit  ut  tyrannicidarum  prcemia , aut  vi- 
tiatarum  electiones,  aut  pestilent!®  remidia,  aut  incesta  matrum,  aut  quicquid 
in  schola  quotidie  agitur,  in  foro  vel  raro  vel  nunquam,  ingentibus  verbis  perse- 
quuntur ; ” and  Petron.  Satyr.  1. : “ Et  ideo  adulescentulos  existimo  in  scholis 
stultissimos  fieri,  quia  nihil  ex  iis  quae  in  usu  habemus  aut  audiunt  aut  vident, 
sed  piratas  cum  catenis  in  litore  stantes,  sed  tyrannos  edicta  scribentes,”  &c. 

1 The  well-known  line  of  Juvenal, 

“ Cum  perimit  saevos  classis  numerosa  tyrannos,” 
is  confirmed  by  Tacitus  above  cited,  and  by  the  subjects  of  some  of  the  decla- 
mations ascribed  to  Quintilian,  which  have  come  down  to  us.  The  only  excep- 
tions to  this  licence  of  teaching  mentioned  in  history,  are  the  case  of  Carrinas 
Secundus,  banished  by  Caius  for  declaiming  in  favour  of  tyrannicide  (Dion,  fix. 
20.),  and  of  the  rhetor  Yirginius  and  the  philosopher  Musonius  Rufus,  pro- 
scribed by  Nero,  as  Tacitus  says,  on  account  of  their  influence  over  youth,  but 
ostensibly  implicated  in  the  conspiracy  of  Piso. — Ann.  xv.  71. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


183 


present  no  real  difficulty  to  the  enforcement  of  such  restric- 
tions, had  it  been  the  wish  of  the  government  to  enforce 
them.  The  noble  Roman,  indeed,  surrounded  by  freedmen 
and  clients  of  various  ability,  by  rhetoricians  and  sophists, 
poets  and  declaimers,  had  within  his  own  doors  private  aid 
for  executing  his  literary  projects ; and  when  his  work  was 
compiled,  he  had  in  the  slaves  of  his  household  the  hands  for 
multiplying  copies,  for  dressing  and  binding  them,  and  send- 
ing forth  an  edition,  as  we  should  say,  of  his  work  to  the  select 
public  of  his  own  class  or  society.1  The  circulation  of  com- 
positions thus  manipulated  might  be  to  some  extent  surrepti- 
tious and  secret.  But  such  a mode  of  proceeding  was  neces- 
sarily confined  to  few.  The  ordinary  writer  must  have  had 
recourse  to  a professional  publisher,  who  undertook,  as  a 
tradesman,  to  present  his  work  for  profit  to  the  world.  Upon 
these  agents  the  government  might  have  had  all  the  hold  it  re- 
quired : yet  it  never  demanded  the  sight  beforehand  of  any 
speech,  essay,  or  satire  which  was  advertised  as  about  to  ap- 
pear. It  was  still  content  to  punish  after  publication  what  it 
deemed  to  be  censurable  excesses.  Severe  and  arbitrary  as 
some  of  its  proceedings  were  in  this  respect,  of  which  in- 
stances have  been  already  recorded,  it  must  be  allowed  that 
these  prosecutions  of  written  works  were  rare  and  exception- 
al, and  that  the  traces  we  discover  of  the  freedom  of  letters, 
even  under  the  worst  emperors,  leave  on  the  whole  a strong 
impression  of  the  general  leniency  of  their  policy  in  this  par- 
ticular.2 

The  fear,  indeed,  of  such  retrospective  censorship  had 
damped  the  ardour  of  men  of  letters  through  the  dark  days 
of  Tiberius,  and  no  man  coveted  eminence  as  a ^ indu]g_ 
writer  under  the  tyranny  of  his  successor,  who  compeSsa? 
proscribed  Homer  and  Yirgil,  and  scowled  with  ^poppub-* 
envious  moroseness  upon  every  kind  of  excel-  Reaction, 
lence.  But  Claudius  was  a patron  of  letters,  perhaps  not 

1 See  Corn.  Nep.  in  Alt.  13. ; Cic.  ad  Alt.  iv.  4.  5.  8.,  xiii.  12.  44. 

2 The  patience  of  Nero  under  the  bitterest  pasquinades  is  remarked  but  not 
explained  by  Suetonius,  Ner.  39. : “ Mirum  et  vel  praecipue  notabile  inter  haec 


184 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


an  unenlightened  patriot.  Historical  composition  flourished 
again  under  the  auspices  of  the  imperial  historian.  The  ac- 
cession of  Hero,  youthful  and  benign  to  every  talent,  was  the 
signal  for  renewed  activity  in  all  departments  of  literature, 
particularly  in  the  lighter,  such  as  might  expect  special  coun- 
tenance from  the  favourite  of  Apollo.  Undoubtedly  the 
licence  which  was  extended  to  writings  at  this  period  was 
accepted  by  the  mass  of  the  rising  generation  of  educated 
men,  as  compensation  for  the  restraints  imposed  on  them  in 
active  life.  While  the  interchange  of  thought  was  free,  or 
appeared  so,  they  might  fondly  persuade  themselves  that 
they  were  freemen  themselves.  Here,  at  least,  the  traditions 
of  the  republic  were  unbroken. 

Hor  are  we  to  suppose  that  the  circle  of  readers  was  so 
small  that  the  government  could  safely  despise  the  influence 
Consideration  °f  an  unpalatable  composition.  Whatever  was 
of  the  cSsTof  its  extent  it  was  coincident,  at  least,  with  the 
readers.  class  of  which  the  government  was  naturally 

most  jealous.  The  publications  of  Home  were  perused  no 
doubt  by  the  senators,  the  knights,  and  the  freedmen  of  the 
city:  there  is  evidence  to  show  that  in  many  cases  they 
penetrated  far  into  the  provinces,  and  for  some  kinds  of 
writings,  at  least,  there  was  a regular  sale  at  Lugdunum,  or 
any  other  provincial  capital.1  Some  curious  calculations 
have  been  made,  to  show  that  the  rapidity  with  which  copies 
could  be  multiplied  by  hand  from  dictation  was  little  less 
than  that  of  printing.  It  is  not  impossible  that  a limited 
number  of  copies,  a hundred  for  instance,  could  be  written 

fuit,  nihil  eum  patientius  quam  maledicta  et  convicia  hominum  tulisse,  neque  in 
ullos  leniorem,  quam  qui  se  dictis  aut  carminibus  lacessissent,  exstitisse.”  He 
proceeds  to  cite  examples,  some  of  which  have  been  quoted  in  the  preceding 
chapter. 

1 The  authorities  on  this  subject  are  collected,  but  with  little  critical  dis- 
crimination, by  Adolf  Schmidt.  DenJc  und  Glaubensfreiheit,  pp.  116.  125. 
The  younger  Pliny,  as  a metropolitan  man  of  letters,  imagined  there  could  be 
no  such  thing  as  a bookseller  at  Lugdunum ; he  was  the  more  pleased  to  learn 
that  his  own  compositions  were  on  sale  there,  among  the  latest  publications  of 
the  trade  at  Rome.  See  Epist.  ix.  11. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


185 


off  quicker  in  this  way  in  the  librarian’s  workshop,  than  a 
single  one  could  be  set  up  in  type  by  the  printer.  This,  of 
course,  supposes  the  employment  of  a multitude  of  scribes ; 
but  these  were  slaves  cheaply  purchased  and  maintained  at 
little  cost.1  The  exceedingly  low  price  of  books  at  Rome, 
if  we  may  take  the  poems  of  a popular  author  as  an  example, 
show  that  the  labour  must  have  been  much  less  or  much 
cheaper  than  we  usually  imagine.2  The  world  of  Roman 
society,  the  circles  of  rank  and  fashion,  in  the  city  and  its 
neighbourhood,  were  permeated  by  the  published  thoughts 
of  their  favourite  writers  with  electric  speed  and  electric  dif- 
fusiveness.3 It  would  be  too  much  to  dignify  with  the  name 
of  devotion  to  literature  the  aptitude  of  the  educated  Roman 
for  the  use  of  his  style  and  tablets.  No  doubt  the  vice  of  the 
system  of  instruction  imparted  to  him  was  its  tendency  to 
degenerate  into  the  conning  of  facts,  maxims,  and  the  com- 
monplaces of  the  schools,  rather  than  the  cultivation  of 
thought.  Trained  from  childhood  to  observe  and  imitate,  he 
was  versed  in  all  the  forms  of  literature,  while  he  lacked  per- 
haps the  ideas  to  fill  them.  Hence  the  facility  with  which 
mere  children,  as  in  the  cases  more  than  once  referred  to, 
produced  set  orations  on  hackneyed  subjects.  With  their 

1 Schmidt’s  remarks  on  this  subject  are  well  worth  considering.  He  says 
boldly,  “ was  in  der  Gegenwart  fur  die  Literatur  die  Presse  ist,  das  war  im  Al- 
terthum  die  Sklaverei,”  p.  119.  Certainly  the  means  possessed  by  the  ancients 
for  multiplying  copies  were  far  beyond  those  of  the  middle  ages. 

2 For  the  exceeding  cheapness  of  the  most  popular  books  see  Martial,  i 
118.:  “ Denariis  tibi  quinque  Martialem.”  It  would  seem  that  a copy  of  one 
book  at  least  of  Martial  (about  '700  lines),  smoothed  with  pumice,  and  elegantly 
bound,  was  sold  for  3s.  4 d. ; a plainer  copy  (comp.  i.  61.)  for  about  Is.  6 c?.,  or 
(xiii.  3.)  even  for  4c?.,  and  still  leave  a profit  to  the  bookseller : 

“ Omnis  in  hoc  gracili  Xeniorum  turba  libello 
Constabit  nummis  quatuor  empta  tibi. 

Quatuor  est  nimium : poterit  constare  duobus ; 

Et  faciet  lucrum  bibliopola  Tryphon.” 

3 One  book  of  Martial  (540  verses)  could  be  transcribed  in  an  hour  (ii.  1. 
5.) : “ hsec  una  peragit  librarius  hora.”  On  the  rapidity  of  writing  Schmidt 
quotes  Galen,  De  Cogn.  Morb.  c.  9.,  which  shows  that  shorthand  was  in  com- 
mon use  for  published  books.  Schmidt,  pp.  132.  136. 


186 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


notebooks  crammed  with  the  accumulated  jottings  from  a 
long  course  of  dictations,  they  were  prepared  to  produce,  at 
short  notice,  passable  exercitations  on  any  ordinary  topic. 
Ovid,  speaking  of  the  precocity  of  his  poetical  talent,  tells 
us  that  in  childhood  his  thoughts  ran  spontaneously  in  verse ; 
and  the  phrases  with  which  the  tablets  or  the  memory  of  the 
Romans  were  stored  might  seem  of  their  own  accord  to  take 
the  form  of  continuous  composition.  Almost  every  distin- 

Faciiities  at  guished  man  among  them  seems  to  have  kept  his 

tending  the  journal  or  Ephemerides  ; to  have  made  collec- 

composition  . . . . 

and  muitipiica-  tions  ot  wise  and  witty  sayings ; to  have  turned 

tion  of  books.  „ . . . J J ° ’ _ 

some  oi  his  observations  on  men  and  things  into 
verse;  to  have  strung  together  a volume  of  miscellaneous 
extracts  from  his  reading;  and  the  transcription  of  a few 
copies  of  these  stray  leaves  constituted  the  publication  of 
Characteristics  a book.  With  the  character  of  the  common  liter- 
SiLratoSthe  ature  °f  the  day  the  Caesarean  government  had 
time-  every  selfish  reason  to  be  satisfied.  It  was  en- 

grossing ; it  occupied  many  restless  minds  to  the  exclusion 
of  all  dangerous  subjects,  either  of  action  or  reflection.  It 
seems  to  have  been  lively ; it  was,  at  least,  fascinating.  It 
was  generally  voluptuous,  to  enervate  the  strong  and  dar- 
ing ; it  was  satisfied  with  a low  range  of  topics,  leaving 
loftier  themes  to  reserved  and  solitary  genius.  Such  was 
the  kind  of  literature  in  which  Nero  himself  was  ambi- 
tious of  shining ; such  were  the  writings  he  could  best  ap- 
preciate. The  few  remaining  verses  which  are  ascribed  to 
him,  or  supposed  to  be  parodies  upon  him,  seem  to  show  that 
he  was  a proficient  in  the  lilting  metre  and  empty  prettiness 
of  expression  which  marked  the  poetical  style  of  his  tutor.1 
He  is  said,  indeed,  to  have  aspired  to  the  fame  of  an  historian, 
and  to  have  taken  for  his  subject  the  Affairs  of  Rome.  His 
performance,  however,  never  went  beyond  a consideration  of 
the  number  of  books  to  which  the  work  should  extend.  The 

1 Seneca  (Nat.  Qu.  i.  5.)  quotes  a verse  of  Nero’s  : — 

“ Colla  Cytkeriacre  splendent  agitata  columbse.” 

The  well-known  line  in  Persius,  Sat.  i.,  are  not  improbably  parodies. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


187 


emperor,  urged  a flatterer,  should  not  deign  to  compose  less 
than  four  hundred  volumes  on  the  imperial  theme.  The  Stoic 
Cornutus  bluntly  suggested  that  the  public  would  not  read  a 
work  so  prolix.  Yet,  replied  Nero,  your  master  Chrysippus 
wrote  as  many  books.  . . . But  they  at  least , returned  the 
sage,  were  of  some  use  to  mankind? 

But  whatever  the  truth  of  this  story  may  he,  the  Romans 
of  this  age  were  not  solely  triflers  in  the  drama,  in  epigram 
and  fugitive  poetry ; men  were  found  not  only  to 

3 r J 9 . J Fashion  of  his- 

write  hut  to  read  vast  compilations  of  history,  toricai  compo- 
now  known  to  us  only  hy  the  number  of  volumes 
they  are  said  to  have  filled.  The  works  of  the  emperor 
Claudius,  of  Servilius  Nonianus,  and  Aufidius  Bassus,  attest 
the  patient  labour  of  these  men  of  letters ; men  who  must 
have  looked  for  reputation  rather  from  the  recitation  of  their 
compositions,  hook  by  hook,  to  select  audiences,  than  to  their 
wide  dissemination  hy  the  labour  of  copyists.  An  account 
of  the  life  and  studies  of  the  elder  Pliny,  the  type  of  Roman 
industry  at  the  same  time  both  in  affairs  and  let-  Extraordinary 
ters,  will  find  its  proper  place  at  a later  period ; 
hut  we  may  here  remark  that  during  the  reign  Plin^ 
of  Nero  this  distinguished  man,  after  holding  for  many  years 
a military  command  in  Germany,  was  devoting  himself  to 
study  in  retirement,  meditating  a history  of  the  German  wars 
which  he  deemed  it  inexpedient  to  put  on  paper  in  times  of 
tyranny,  composing  a work  on  grammar  and  a treatise  on  the 
literary  life,  accumulating  extracts  from  his  reading  or  notes 
of  his  thoughts  and  conversation  which  extended  at  his  death 
to  a hundred  and  sixty  volumes,  and  preparing  slowly  and 
methodically,  from  the  perusal  of  many  hundreds  of  works, 
the  wonderful  encyclopaedia  of  Roman  arts  and  learning 
which  he  published  eventually  under  the  name  of  the  Natu- 
ral History. 

The  noble  Roman  chafed  indeed  at  the  restraints  which 
prudence  prescribed  him  in  the  relation  of  contemporary 


2 Dion,  Ixii.  29. 


188 


HISTORV  OF  THE  ROMANS 


Discourage-  events,  ID  W llicll  truth  COuld  Seldom  1)0  told  With." 

temporary* his-  out  impugning  the  conduct  of  men  in  power, 
toiy*  court  favourites  or  court  parasites,  if  it  did  not  hit 

the  blots  in  the  character  of  Ctesar  himself.  It  was  still  more 
galling,  perhaps,  to  leave  the  field  open  to  the  flatterers  and 
intriguers  who  debased  history  into  mere  panegyric,  and  filled 
the  ear  of  Rome  with  unblushing  falsehood.  The  harsh  re- 
pression exercised  towards  the  utterers  of  the  truth  in  this 
particular,  had  deterred  the  most  honourable  men  from  her 
ill-requited  service,  and  checked  the  license  of  remark  on  the 
personages  around  him  which  the  Roman  magnate  cherished 
as  his  birthright.  To  many  this  restraint  on  personal  criti- 
cism was  the  sorest  point  in  their  servitude.  But  with  this 
exception  the  mind  of  the  educated  classes  still  flowed  freely 
enough  in  the  well-worn  channels  of  literature,  and  the  sta- 
bility of  the  government  was  no  doubt,  in  a great  degree, 
founded  on  the  ease  and  freedom  with  which  the  men  of  let- 
ters moved  in  their  chains,  and  their  general  acquiescence  in 
the  position  assigned  them.1 

The  class,  never  numerous  at  Rome,  which  interested  it- 
self in  moral  speculations,  had  enjoyed  remarkable  freedom 
from  interference  at  the  hands  of  constituted  au- 
thority. The  proud  aristocracy  of  the  senate  was 


Alliance  of 

jjjome  with  re-  ■.■.-i-ii 

ligion  and  gov-  little  troubled  by  the  nervous  alarms  at  hetero- 
doxy, so  common  to  half-instructed  democracies, 
full  of  prejudices,  and  conscious  of  their  want  of  skill  and 
learning  to  defend  them.  Hence,  except  once  or  twice,  at 
moments  of  great  intellectual  disturbance,  the  government 
of  the  Free  State  had  suffered  the  philosophers  to  teach  as 
they  pleased,  and  put  no  restraints  on  the  spirit  of  inquiry 
which  was  sapping  the  positive  beliefs  of  the  day.  If  it  ever 
evinced  any  jealousy  of  the  new  teaching,  it  was  against 


the  Greek 


foreigner, 


not  against  the  heretic, 


the 


1 It  is  fair  to  remark,  on  the  other  hand,  that  the  strictures  of  contempo- 
rary history  were  not  checked  at  Rome,  as  among  ourselves  within  recent  times, 
by  the  code  of  honour,  nor  practically  at  least,  as  it  would  appear,  by  a law  of 
libel. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


189 


enemy  of  Rome,  not  the  enemy  of  the  gods,  that  it  was  di- 
rected. The  full  establishment  of  the  Roman  power  in  the 
East  was  followed  by  complete  acquiescence  in  the  teaching, 
however  liberal  and  daring,  which  flowed  from  that  source  to 
the  West.  From  the  last  century  of  the  republic  all  attempt 
at  interference  ceased.  The  young  Roman  noble  was  initia- 
ted, as  a matter  of  course,  in  the  contentions  of  the  Academy 
and  the  Lyceum ; he  traversed  the  inevitable  career  from 
doubt  to  rationalism,  and  from  rationalism  to  doubt  again ; 
while  neither  priests  nor  magistrates  complained  of  the  new 
sphere  of  ideas  into  which  he  was  launched,  sure,  as  they 
were,  to  extinguish  in  his  mind  the  old  belief  of  his  country- 
men. All  the  Grecian  schools  agreed  at  least  in  one  thing, 
namely,  to  inculcate  outward  respect  for  established  forms 
of  religion  as  an  instrument  of  government.  It  might  be 
curious  to  trace  the  origin  of  this  peculiar  feature  in  their 
teaching ; whether  it  was  a prudent  concession  to  the  de- 
mands of  the  authorities,  under  which  they  taught ; whether 
they  were  unconsciously  swayed  by  the  apprehension  that 
in  the  uncertainty  which  confessedly  hung  over  their  own 
undetermined  principles,  the  Voice  of  the  People  might  be 
after  all  a faint  echo  of  the  Voice  of  God:  but  so  it  was  that 
Stoic,  Epicurean,  Peripatetic  and  Eclectic,  all  consented  to 
practise  on  public  occasions  the  rites  which  they  not  less 
openly  derided  in  their  speaking  and  writing.  The  compro- 
mise was  certainly  effectual,  at  least  to  a late  period. 

Modern  despotisms  are  charged  with  allowing  the  freest 
licence  of  religious  discussion,  not  in  the  interest  of  truth, 
but  as  a necessary  compensation  for  the  silence  Attitude  of  op- 
they  impose  upon  all  discussion  on  politics.1 * * * *  It  fmmen/firsiT* 
will  be  seen  that  if  Roman  imperialism  is  liable  under*8 
to  the  same  charge,  it  was  at  least  no  new  inven-  1116  empire- 

1 This  charge,  so  commonly  made  against  certain  Continental  governments 

at  the  present  day,  and  with  peculiar  force  against  the  old  monarchy  of  France 

(see  De  Tocqueville’s  instructive  book,  VAnden  Regime  et  la  Revolution , liv.  ii. 

ch.  11.,  liv.  iii.  ch.  2.),  may  be  extended,  I conceive,  with  equal  truth  to  oligar- 

chies generally. 


190 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


tion  of  tyranny.  The  Sceptic  and  the  Atheist  had  been  al- 
lowed full  scope  under  the  government  of  the  senate,  and  the 
Caesars,  in  leaving  religion  still  open  to  their  attacks,  only 
followed  the  state  tradition  bequeathed  them  from  the  repub- 
lic. The  philosophers,  however,  while  they  accepted  free- 
dom as  their  right,  were  not  bound  thereby  to  keep  terms 
with  the  government  which  condescended  to  grant  it.  They 
had  a higher  mission,  and  a corresponding  sense  of  duty. 
With  the  gross  and  immoral  practices,  indeed,  allowed,  en- 
couraged, sometimes  even  prescribed,  by  the  Pagan  supersti- 
tions, philosophy  did  not  concern  herself.  She  did  not  stoop 
to  inform  or  amend  the  ignorant  rabble  of  the  temple- wor- 
shippers : but  the  opposition  between  her  and  the  govern- 
ment became  flagrantly  wicked  and  tyrannical,  was  more  and 
more  openly  avowed.  The  wisdom  of  the  Porch  was  not  the 
antagonist  of  vulgar  vices ; but  her  precepts,  addressed  to 
the  ruling  classes  of  the  empire,  stood  forth  in  bold  and 
startling  hostility  to  the  principles  of  existing  authority.  The 
city  of  the  Stoics  was  the  city  of  God,  not  the  city  of  Caesar. 
The  empire  for  which  they  sighed  on  earth  was  the  empire  of 
the  best  and  wisest,  of  the  oligarchs  of  reason,  not  the  em- 
pire of  the  blind  ignoble  multitude  impersonated  in  the  tri- 
bune of  its  choice.  Christian  moralists  have  taunted  Stoic- 
ism with  the  hopeless  distance  at  which  it  stood  from  the 
sympathies  of  mankind  in  general.  Such,  they  say,  is  the 
nature  of  man,  that  it  requires  the  prospect  of  reward,  here 
or  hereafter,  as  an  efficient  stimulus  to  virtue.  This  argu- 
ment is  probably  true,  and  as  a general  proposition  no  doubt 
the  Stoics  would  have  also  admitted  it.  But,  having  them- 
selves no  assurance  of  any  such  retributive  Providence,  they 
aimed  at  raising  the  choicest  spirits  from  the  common  level 
to  a higher  standard  of  excellence,  and  inculcated  duty  with- 
out reward  as  the  end  of  existence,  not  as  a religion  for  the 
many,  but  as  a philosophy  for  the  few.  Shocked  as  their  no- 
bler instincts  were  at  the  vile  degradation  of  the  multitude, 
they  conceived  the  Truth  as  something  unappreciable  by  it. 
Could  the  Truth  have  been  made  intelligible  to  mankind  in 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


191 


general,  it  would,  in  their  view,  have  ceased  to  be  Truth  at 
all.  And  this,  after  all,  was  very  similar  to  the  view  of 
Christianity  itself  entertained  by  some  of  our  primitive  teach- 
ers. Tertullian  in  a striking  passage  asserted  broadly  that  the 
Caesars  would  long  since  have  been  converted  to  Christianity, 
if  Christians  could  be  themselves  Caesars,  that  is,  if  govern- 
ment could  be  Christian.1  Christianity,  he  conceived,  must 
always  stand  apart  from  the  ordinary  march  of  affairs ; the 
true  faith  could  only  be  the  faith  of  a chosen  congregation  ; 
mankind  in  general  were  equally  incapable  of  moral  renova- 
tion and  of  spiritual  conversion. 

Let  the  Stoics,  then,  be  judged  solely  by  what  they  at- 
tempted. Their  aims  were  high,  but  not  wide-reaching. 
They  sought  to  make  some  men  more  than  hu- 

, . . . . . Principles  on 

man,  but  there  was  no  question  with  them  oi  the  which  stoicism 

i m,  , i . is  to  be  judged. 

lew  or  the  many,  lhey  boasted  that  their  pre- 
ternatural standard  of  holiness  was  not  absolutely  unattain- 
able, and  if  they  could  point  to  a single  Cato  or  a single 
Thrasea,  as  having  attained  to  it,  their  problem  was  solved, 
their  principle  was  established.  Virtue  had  become  imper- 
sonate. Man  had  become  God.  The  end  of  creation  was 
accomplished.  Even  from  the  attempt  to  accomplish  this 
end,  however  imperfectly,  other  blessings  might  flow,  indi- 
rectly and  collaterally : though,  indeed,  by  the  true  mystic 
of  the  Porch  these  were  little  heeded.  The  aspirations,  how- 
ever, of  the  Stoics  in  general  were  really  less  visionary  and 
unpractical.  They  descended  from  the  clouds  to  earth  to  im- 
pregnate with  noble  and  fruitful  principles  such  forms  of 
government  as  were  actually  accessible  to  them.  Captivated 
as  they  often  were  by  the  aspect  of  the  law,  as  the  exponent 
of  the  Divine  Will,  the  representative  of  Divine  Justice  upon 
earth,  they  devoted  themselves  to  moulding  it  to  their  no- 
tions, and  informed  it  with  wise  and  lofty  maxims.  Stoicism 
enlarged  the  minds  of  its  worthy  votaries  by  purer  concep- 
tions of  Deity,  and.  more  liberal  views  of  humanity,  teaching 

1 Tertull.  Apo’og.  21. : “ Sed  et  Caesares  credidissent  super  Christo,  si  aut 
Caesares  non  essent  saeculo  necessarii,  aut  si  Christiani  potuissent  esse  Ccesares .” 


192 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


the  unity  of  God  with  man,  and  of  men  with  one  another, 
asserting  the  supremacy  of  the  Will  over  the  Passions,  of 
Mind  over  Matter,  of  eternal  Duty  over  temporal  Expediency. 
It  sublimed  every  aspiration  after  the  Good,  the  Just,  the 
Honourable,  by  pronouncing  it  the  instinct  of  divinity  with- 
in us.  The  immortality  of  the  soul,  the  triumph  of  the  Right- 
eous, a fleeting  Present  and  an  illimitable  Future,  these  in- 
deed were  doctrines  which  some  Stoics  held,  some  perhaps 
ventured  to  teach  dogmatically  : but  they  were  not  the  true 
vital  principles  of  the  sect ; they  savoured  too  much  of  offer- 
ing bribes  to  virtue,  they  were,  in  short,  too  popular,  to  se- 
duce the  sterner  preachers  of  a morality  which  must  have  no 
regard  either  to  punishment  on  the  one  hand,  or  reward  on 
the  other.1 

Galling  indeed  to  the  selfish  voluptuaries  of  the  palace 
must  have  been  the  bold  and  even  ostentatious  preaching  of 
„ these  soul-stirring  doctrines,  which  seemed  to  pro- 

Stoicismat-  ° r 

tractive  at  this  claim  a higher  freedom  than  that  of  the  bodv,  a 

period  to  the  . _ , 

noblest  charac-  no  bier  existence  than  that  of  the  world  and  the 
flesh.2  Whatever  there  was  of  ardour,  of  gen- 
erosity and  self-devotion,  among  the  Roman  youth  at  this  era 
of  national  torpor,  was  absorbed  in  the  strong  current  of 
Stoicism.  The  Epicurism  of  the  earlier  empire  had  been  the 
plea  of  men  who  were  ashamed  of  the  renunciation  they  had 
made  of  their  independence.  But  since  independence  had 
become  a mere  phantom  of  the  past,  the  philosophy  which 


1 Epictetus  and  Marcus  Aurelius,  says  M.  Denis  (Idees  Morales  dans  V Anti- 
quity ii.  253.),  faithful  to  the  old  traditions  of  the  Porch,  speak  but  faintly  and 
obscurely  on  the  immortality  of  the  soul.  The  only  philosophers  who  formally 
admit  it  are  Seneca,  Plutarch,  and  Maximus  Tyrius ; the  former  as  a matter  of 
hope,  the  others  as  an  incontestable  dogma. 

2 The  expression  “ the  flesh”  for  human  passions,  which  has  been  almost 
appropriated  to  Christian  teaching,  is  found  at  this  time  in  Seneca.  In  the 
Consolatio  ad  Marciam,  c.  24.,  he  says,  as  St.  Paul  might  have  said : “ Animo 
cum  carne  grave  certamen.”  Comp.  Persius,  Sat.  ii.  in  fin. : 

“ Et  bona  Dis  ex  hac  scelerata  ducere  pulpa.” 

It  had  been  already  used  commonly  by  Philo,  who  took  it  perhaps  from  the 
Septuagint.  Sirac.  xxiii.  23. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


193 


excused  men  for  deserting  it  was  no  longer  specially  attrac- 
tive ; while  Stoicism,  which  could  substitute  a higher  object 
in  its  place,  assumed  in  its  turn  the  ascendant.  Under  the 
Free  State  it  had  generally  been  admitted  that  the  maxims 
of  the  Porch,  stiff  and  harsh  as  they  were,  ill  accorded  with 
the  conduct  of  public  affairs,  and  the  government  of  mankind 
in  general.  The  experience,  perhaps  the  instinct,  of  the  free- 
born Roman  assured  him  that  a man  could  not  be  an  active 
and  useful  citizen,  and  at  the  same  time  the  disciple  of  a 
speculative  Puritanism.  The  pretensions  of  the  jurist  Sul- 
picius  to  unite  the  two  characters  had  moved  the  derision  of 
Cicero : the  attempt  of  Cato  had  issued  in  more  serious  con- 
sequences; it  had  hastened  the  fall  of  the  republic.  But 
these  men  had  few  admirers  or  followers  in  their  own  day. 
It  was  under  the  empire,  when  man’s  free  will  had  no  longer 
scope  for  action,  that  the  philosophy  which  exalted  Fate  above 
all  human  affairs  found  acceptance  with  thoughtful  and  mel- 
ancholy idlers.  Stoicism  became  a consolation  for  inactivity 
not  a stimulus  to  action.  Views  of  the  highest  wisdom 
which  led  men’s  speculations  away  from  the  deceitful  shows 
of  life,  and  fixed  them  upon  ideal  excellences,  might  be  an 
object  of  suspicion  to  the  government ; they  might  be  inter- 
preted by  timid  and  jealous  rulers  as  discontent  with  exist- 
ing circumstances,  disaffection  towards  the  empire,  a disposi- 
tion to  change  and  innovation.  N evertheless,  the  ^ charge 
charge  against  them,  which  Tacitus  supposes  to  Samldons- 
have  been  urged  by  Tigellinus,  that  they  made  X“£S'not 
men  restless  and  ambitious  meddlers  with  affairs,  we]1  £rounded- 
is  strongly  belied  by  all  we  read  about  the  most  genuine 
and  consistent  professors  of  Stoicism  at  this  period  at  Rome.1 
Possibly  it  is  not  intended  to  express  the  opinion  of  the  au- 
thor himself : possibly  it  is  directed  against  the  false  pretend- 
ers to  the  title,  or  the  ardent  patriots  who  failed  to  recognise 
the  purely  spiritual  character  of  its  precepts.  Seneca  seems, 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  57. : “ Assumpta  Stoicorum  arrogantia,  sectacque,  quae  tur- 
bidos  et  negotiorum  appetentes  faciat.” 

VOL.  vi.— 13 


194 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


at  all  events,  to  speak  more  accurately,  when  he  says  that 
they  are  in  error  who  imagine  that  the  true  philosopher  is 
contumacious,  refractory,  a despiser  of  magistrates  and  gov- 
ernments.1 2 Even  the  notion,  so  commonly  adopted,  that  the 
Stoics  particularly  devoted  themselves  to  the  science  of  law, 
and  played  a great  part  in  constructing  the  fabric  of  Roman 
jurisprudence,  is  much  mistaken  or  exaggerated.8  The  legal 
principles  which  can  be  traced  to  their  moral  maxims  are  but 
few  ; and,  indeed,  the  reasoners  who  were  bound  to  maintain 
the  equality  of  all  sins  could  hardly  have  interested  them- 
selves in  the  just  apportionment  of  punishments  to  crimes. 
All  enthusiasm,  no  doubt,  is  hateful  to  tyranny.  The  enthu- 
siasm of  the  Stoics  was  to  be  feared,  to  be  watched,  to  be 
controlled.  Yet  this  sentiment,  checked  as  it  was  by  the 
force  of  circumstances,  and  the  deadly  apathy  of  society 
around  it,  passed  in  many  noble  spirits  of  the  sect  into  a kind 
of  quietism.  They  had  no  concern  with  the  republic ; they 
lived  under  the  gods,  not  under  Caesar.3 4  It  became  their  aim 
and  pride  rather  to  bear  all  things  than  to  dare  any  thing. 
They  tried  to  persuade  the  emperor  that  he  was  a slave,  but 
thev  made  no  attempt  to  deprive  him  of  his  sov- 

Political  inno-  f i-..,  i . 

cenceofits  ereignty.  Nero  would  smile,  perhaps,  at  the  dee- 

1 ; lamations  he  heard  on  the  splendid  text  of  the 

poet : Great  Father  of  the  Gods , punish  Thou  tyrants  no 
other  wise  than  thus  : let  them  behold  the  Virtue  they  have 
abandoned , and  pine  away  at  the  loss  of  her?  On  the 

1 Senec.  Ep.  IS. : “ Errare  mihi  videntur  qui  existimant  philosophise  fideli- 
ter  deditos  contumaces  esse  ac  refractarios,  et  contemptores  magistratuum.” 

2 This  remark  is  opposed  to  the  common  opinion  of  the  commentators  on 
Roman  law,  which  the  few  and  trifling  coincidences  which  Heineccius  discovers 
between  the  Stoic  and  the  legal  principles  are  surely  not  sufficient  to  justify. 
See  Antiqu.  Rom.  i.  i.  3.  That  under  the  early  empire  many  jurisconsults  were 
Stoics  would  naturally  follow  from  the  prevalence  of  the  Stoic  philosophy  among 
the  highest  order  of  minds  at  that  period. 

3 So  Apollonius  of  Tyana,  himself  an  Eclectic,  could  say  in  the  true  spirit  of 
the  Stoics : e/ioi  'Kokirdag  pb  ovdefuag  pklu  • £«  yap  vi ro  roig  deolg. — Philostr. 
Vii.  Apoll.  v.  35. 

4 Persius,  Sat.  iii.  35 : — 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


195 


whole,  then,  the  philosophers  were  little  offensive  to  the  gov- 
ernment. They  enjoyed  accordingly  an  impunity  which  they 
might  mistake  for  deference.  It  was  known,  perhaps,  that 
they  were  discredited  among  the  masses  of  the  people  by  the 
worthless  character  of  the  many  hypocrites  who  assumed 
their  name ; and  the  emperors  observed  with  complacency  the 
popular  suspicion  under  which  the  best  men  laboured,  con- 
founded as  they  too  often  were  with  notorious  pretenders.1 
To  a late  period  in  Nero’s  reign  they  remained,  as  we  have 
seen,  entirely  unmolested : it  was  not  till  they  were  urged  by 
patriotism  or  humanity  to  engage  in  the  intrigues  of  politi- 
cal conspirators,  that  they  became  objects  themselves  of  im- 
perial hostility.  Even  then,  the  proscriptions  fell  on  individ- 
uals only ; it  was  never  extended  to  the  class : the  schools 
were  never  closed,  the  teachers  were  never  silenced,  the  prin- 
ciples were  never  condemned.2  All  this  we  shall  witness  at 
a later  period ; though  Stoicism,  we  shall  still  remark,  was 

“ Magne  Pater  Divum,  saevos  punire  tyrannos  .... 

Haud  alia  ratione  velis  .... 

Yirtutem  videant  intabescantque  relicta.” 

1 Quintil.  procem.  Inst.  i.  “ Veterum  quidem  sapientiae  professorum  multos 
et  honesta  praecepisse,  et  ut  praeceperunt  etiam  vixisse,  facile  concesserim : nos 
tris  vero  temporibus  sub  hoc  nomine  maxima  in  plerisque  vitia  latuerunt : non 
enim  virtute  et  studiis  ut  haberentur  philosophi  laborabant,  sed  vultum  et  tris- 
titiam,  et  dissentientem  a caeteris  habitum  pessimis  moribus  praetendebant. 
Comp.  Juvenal,  ii.  3. : — 

“ Qui  Curios  simulant  et  Bacchanalia  vivunt  .... 

Fronti  nulla  tides,”  &c. 

2 Canus  Julius,  the  Stoic,  is  reputed  the  first  of  the  philosophers  who  suffer- 
ed from  the  jealousy  of  the  empire.  The  circumstances  of  his  death,  under 
Caius,  are  set  forthwith  great  pomp  by  Seneca  ( Tranquill.  Anim.  14.);  but 
the  charges  against  him  are  not  mentioned.  Paetus  suffered  under  Claudius, 
and  many  philosophers  were  sacrificed  by  Nero,  but  always  for  political  offences. 
The  notion  that  Nero  banished  the  philosophers  from  Rome  and  Italy,  though 
commonly  asserted  (see  Imhof,  Domitianus , p.  104.),  is  unquestionably  erro- 
neous. It  rests  merely  on  the  assertion  of  the  rhetorician  Philostratus  ( Vit. 
Apoll.  iv.  35.),  but  this  Brucker  (Hist.  Phil.  ii.  118.)  very  reasonably  interprets 
of  a prohibition  of  magic,  to  which  Appollonius,  according  to  his  biographer, 
pretended.  See  Newman  on  Apollon.  Tyanaeus,  in  the  Encycl.  Metropolitana. 


196 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMAN'S 


not  officially  smitten,  till  it  perversely  attacked  an  indulgent 
prince  and  a liberal  monarchy.  The  pupil  of  Seneca,  at  least, 
is  guiltless  of  the  persecution  of  his  master’s  philosophy.  I 
repeat  that  ve  must  appreciate  to  its  full  extent  the  freedom  of 
thought  conceded  by  the  empire,  to  understand  the  patience 
of  the  Romans  under  the  restraint  it  placed  upon  action. 

But  these  considerations  apply  only  to  the  higher  classes 
of  the  state,  to  which  the  exercise  of  the  intellect  was  a privi- 
The  revival  of  lege  dearly  prized,  earned  by  toil,  guarded  with 
Axifustu^to  a jealousy,  esteemed  the  badge  of  their  pre-emi- 
nence.  Let  us  turn  now  to  the  subjects  which 
ment  interested  the  vulgar  herd  of  the  city  and  the 

•provinces,  and  examine  how  far  the  liberty  allowed  in  these 
respects  might  console  them  for  the  losses  they  sustained, 
when  they  placed  themselves  under  a master’s  control.  Lit- 
tle as  even  the  multitude  believed  in  the  dogmas  of  the 
national  religion,  they  were  still  devotedly  attached  to  their 
ancient  rites  and  usages ; they  required  their  rulers  to  pay 
outward  deference  to  the  gods,  as  symbols,  at  least,  of  truth, 
if  not  truth  itself  actual  and  positive.  The  revival  of  reli- 
gion by  Augustus  was  not  mere  statecraft : it  was  the  ex- 
pression of  a real  want  of  the  age,  and  it  had  great  and  last- 
ing results.  If  it  gave  no  genuine  impulse  to  belief  in  the 
mind  of  the  Romans,  it  nevertheless  undoubtedly  confirmed 
them  for  ages  in  practices  which  had  all  the  signs,  and  some 
perhaps  of  the  effects,  of  actual  belief.  It  reanimated  the 
spirit  of  worship  and  respect  for  superior  existences.  The 
current  of  men’s  spiritual  affections  continued  to  set  steadily 
in  the  direction  of  ritual  observance.  The  restoration,  adorn- 
ing, and  multiplication  of  temples  went  on  from  Caesar  to 
Caesar.  The  established  sacrifices  were  offered,  the  appointed 
auspices  observed,  year  by  year  continually.  There  is  no 
apparent  indication  of  a decrease  in  the  number  of  temple- 
worshippers  ; though  the  stream  of  devotion  might  fluctuate 
towards  rival  fanes,  it  rolled  on  with  undiminished  force  and 
volume.1  The  priesthood  remained  as  grave  and  honourable 

1 This  assertion  is  opposed  to  the  general  opinion,  and  writers  on  the  sub- 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


197 


a function  as  ever ; the  temples  continued  to  receive  lavish 
gifts  and  endowments.  Though  the  most  illustrious  of  the 
oracles  fell  into  disuse,  and  the  silence  of  Apollo  at  Delphi 
was  ascribed  to  the  growing  sinfulness  of  the  times  by  the 
pious  apprehensions  of  the  multitude,  to  the  jealous  policy  of 
kings  by  the  juster  observation  of  political  reasoners,  the 
science  of  divination  flourished  with  unabated  luxuriance,  and 
new  prophets  sprang  into  repute  to  attract  the  inquirers  who 
were  repelled  from  the  voiceless  tripods  of  the  old.1  The 
priests  contrived  to  retain  the  submission  of  the  vulgar,  ever 
willingly  persuaded,  to  their  pretended  communications  with 

ject  have  repeated  one  another,  or  appealed  in  succession  to  a common  stock 
of  texts  in  confirmation  of  a different  view.  I believe  the  texts  in  question  are 
the  following  only : Propert.  ii.  6.  35. : — 

. . . . “Velavit  aranea  fanum 
Et  mala  desertos  occupat  herba  Deos 

and  iii.  13.  47. : — 

“ At  nunc  desertis  cessant  sacraria  lucis, 

Aurum  omnes  victa,  jam  pietate  colunt 

both  of  which,  besides  their  rhetorical  character,  refer  to  a period  antecedent 
to  the  revival  we  are  considering.  Philostratus,  in  Vit.  Apoll.  i.  2.,  says  that 
some  temples  were  refilled  by  his  philosopher  after  having  suffered  desertion  ? 
but  this  does  not  refer  to  Rome  or  Italy.  The  passage  in  Pliny,  Ep.  v.  97.,  and 
Lucian,  Timon , 4.,  refer,  such  as  they  are,  to  another  period.  Such  are  the 
slender  authorities,  however,  which  seem  to  satisfy  Neander,  Kirchengeschichte , 
i.  80.:  Tzschimer,  Fall  des  Eeidenthums , 113.;  and  Schmidt,  a sedulous  col- 
lector of  texts,  Ernie  und  Glaubensfreiheit,  168. 

1 On  the  silence  of  the  Delphic  oracle,  Juvenal,  vi.  555. : — 

. . . . “ Delphis  oracula  cessant.” 

Lucan  gives  one  reason  which  might  be  assigned  for  it : v.  113. : — 

“ Postquam  reges  timuere  futura 
Et  Superos  vetuere  loqui 
And  again,  140. : — 

“ Seu  Paean,  solitus  templis  arcere  nocentes, 

Ora  quibus  solvat  nostro  non  invenit  aevo.” 

Comp.  Plutarch,  de  Eefedu  Oraculorum , 5.  foil.  Lucian,  indeed,  at  a some- 
what later  period,  seems  to  refer  to  Delphi  as  still  prophetic : r/  Tpevdeig  elalv  ol 
vvv  eKTr'nzTovreg  knee  xpqufiol. — ■ Alexander , 42.  But  possibly  the  work  is  not 
genuine. 


198 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


heaven,  by  the  fame  of  wonders  worked  by  images  or  in  tem- 
ples, and  still  more  by  the  supposed  fulfilment  of  their 
auguries.  It  was  the  interest  of  the  government  to  humour 
this  submission  under  discreet  regulations,  and  of  its  more 
enlightened  subjects  to  humour  the  government  itself  by 
affecting  to  join  in  it,  so  that  the  populace  became  the  victim 
of  a double  conspiracy.  The  policy  of  the  state  is  freely 
disclosed  to  us  in  the  counsels  ascribed  by  Dion  to  Maecenas, 
which  no  doubt  represent  in  substance  the  views  of  the  em- 
perors and  their  advisers  even  at  this  period.  Be  careful , he 
said,  yourself  to  worship  the  gods  always  and  everywhere , 
according  to  the  customs  of  Borne , and  compel  others  to  do 
likewise ; but  detest  and  punish  the  promoters  of  strange 
religions , not  for  the  sake  of  the  gods  only , but  because  such 
innovaters  beguile  men  into  foreign  sentiments  and  customs , 
and  hence  arise  plots , combinations , and  clubs , which  are 
especially  dangerous  to  monarchy  ,x  To  maintain  the  exclu- 
sive practice  of  the  genuine  Roman  religion,  if  indeed  it  could 
be  accurately  defined,  had  been  long  deemed  impossible 
under  the  republic.  A compromise  had  been  effected  by 
granting  toleration,  sometimes  by  special  decree,  as  in  the 
case  of  the  Jews,  to  certain  foreign  cults  established  in  their 
own  countries,  which  it  seemed  expedient  to  tolerate,  or 
which  had  taken  too  deep  root  in  Rome  to  be  really  ex- 
tirpated. Any  other  practices  or  belief,  however,  that  made 
their  way  into  the  city  from  abroad,  must  do  so  at  their  peril. 
They  were  liable  at  any  moment  to  legal  animadversion,  and 
it  required  the  enactment  of  no  new,  the  rescinding  of  no  old 
law,  to  expose  them  to  proscription,  whenever  the  jealousy 
of  the  monarchy,  more  sensitive  than  the  Free  State,  was 
awakened  against  them.1 2 

1 Dion,  lii.  36.  Comp.  Cic.  de  leg.  ii.  8. : “ Separatim  nemo  habessit  deos, 
neve  novos,  sive  advenas,  nisi  publice  adscitos,  privatim  colunto.” 

2 Such  was  the  distinction  between  the  religiones  licit®  and  illicit®.  Ter- 
tullian,  Apol.  4.  21. ; Minucius  Felix,  Octav.  8.  Judaism  was  licensed,  though 
occasionally  the  license  was  withdrawn,  and  its  professors  expelled  from  Rome 
by  a special  decree.  Christianity,  as  we  shall  see,  was  unlicensed.  It  had  no 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


199 


The  policy  of  Augustus,  accordingly,  in  the  matter  of  re- 
ligion, was  a more  systematic  enforcement  of  the  principles 
of  the  republic,  namely,  to  endow  the  state  re-  ^ . 

r l •*  7 Position  of  the 

ligion  with  emoluments  and  honours,  to  tolerate  Roman  religion 

° . __  in  relation  to 

certain  accredited  foreign  cults,  but  to  forbid  and  the  supersti- 

,,  , , _ tionsofGaul 

repress  all  strange  and  novel  usages.  It  was  and  Syria  re- 

the  attempt,  in  short,  to  cast  the  religious  sen-  spectlvely- 
timents  of  the  age  in  a mould,  once  for  all,  from  which 
there  should  be  no  escape  for  the  future.1  The  moment 
might  appear  well  chosen  for  such  an  attempt,  when  in  the 
prevailing  fusion  of  nations  and  opinions,  and  the  wide- 
spread disappointment  of  moral  and  religious  speculations, 
men  seemed  content  to  rest  from  all  further  experiment  in 
a decently-veiled  atheism  or  pantheism.  Such  an  attempt 
seems  to  have  succeeded  for  once  in  the  history  of  China ; but 
it  was  singularly  ill-timed,  as  became  speedily  apparent,  in 
the  age  and  clime  which  witnessed  the  origin  of  Christianity. 
And,  indeed,  not  yet  to  advert  to  the  phenomenon  of  the 
Christian  revelation,  the  spiritual  activity  of  the  human  mind 
throughout  the  East,  at  this  moment,  was  such  as  to  defy  the 
control  of  the  emperor’s  or  the  praetor’s  edicts.  The  ideas  of 
Druidism,  th6  religion  of  the  West,  were  almost  powerless. 
In  Rome  they  collapsed  instantaneously ; in  the  cities  of  Gaul 
they  yielded  without  a struggle  to  Roman  forms  and  nomen- 
clature : it  was  only  in  the  deep  woods  and  silent  plains  that 
they  retained  a spark  of  vitality.  Rot  so  the  Syrian  element- 
al-worship; not  so  the  moral  convictions  of  Judaism  and 
Tsabaism.  The  crowds  which  flocked  to  Rome  from  the 
eastern  shores  of  the  Mediterranean  brought  with  them 
practices  and  prejudices  hardly  worthy,  perhaps,  to  be  called 

legal  standing  in  Rome,  and,  not  being  a national  religion,  I presume  it  had  no 
legal  standing  anywhere.  I merely  allude  to  this  subject  here  to  mark  the  dis- 
tinction. 

1 It  may  be  worth  while  to  remind  the  reader  of  the  three  constituent  ele- 
ments of  the  Roman  religion : 1.  the  service  of  the  old  Sabine  or  Italian  divini- 
ties ; 2.  the  aruspicinal  discipline,  &c.,  derived  principally  from  Etruria ; 3. 
the  cult  of  certain  foreign  deities  introduced  generally  by  the  advice  of  special 
oracles  (publice  ascitos),  such  as  those  of  Ceres,  iEsculapius,  and  Cybele. 


200 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


beliefs,  which  disdained  amalgamation  with  Italian  paganism, 
and  however  distorted  they  might  be  from  their  original 
types,  acknowledged  no  constraining  influence  from  the  opin- 
ions and  usages  around  them.  The  stronger  sentiment,  as 
usual,  attracted  and  controlled  the  weaker.  Jupiter  had  con- 
quered Hesus  and  Taranis,  but  he  was  a child  in  the  hands 
of  Mithras  and  Melcarth.  The  broader  forms  of  the  Syrian 
religion,  as  established  in  its  native  countries,  were  tolerated 
in  Rome ; and  from  toleration  they  advanced  without  pause 
or  hesitation  on  a career  of  active  proselytism.  The  symbolic 
rites  of  Cybele  and  Astarte  invaded  the  streets  and  the  forum, 
and  carried  off  crowds  of  worshippers  from  the  shrines  of 
Juno  and  Diana.  But  they  too  were  tolerant  in  their  turn, 
and  demanded  no  exclusive  devotion  from  their  converts: 
the  idleness  and  wealth  of  Rome  could  afford  time  and  means 
for  the  celebration  of  many  new  ceremonies  in  addition  to  the 
simple  performance  of  divine  service  which  its  own  religion 
prescribed.1  They  offered,  and  herein  was  the  secret  of  their 
success,  a mental  excitement  without  the  fatigue  and  agita- 
tion of  argument.  In  philosophy  no  step  could  be  taken 
without  some  use  of  the  reasoning  powers ; every  man  held 
his  opinions  in  defiance  of  all  opponents ; even  the  schools  of 
oratory  as  well  as  of  philosophy  had  their  sects,  their  mas- 
ters, their  maxims,  and  their  disputations.  The  noble  Roman, 
indeed,  for  the  most  part  entertained  a professional  sophist  to 
think  and  argue  for  him : nevertheless  it  was  not  till  he  aban- 
doned his  philosophy  for  his  religion  that  he  was  completely 
relieved  from  intellectual  toil  and  discipline ; and  doubtless 
the  outward  observance  of  ritual  forms  was  in  a great  degree 
the  refuge  to  which  he  fled  from  the  painful  questions  of 
morals  and  metaphysics.  The  curious  and  sometimes  awful 

1 “ Rem  divinam  facere,”  to  perform  holy  rites,  consisted  in  the  occasional 
sacrifice,  the  daily  burning  of  incense  and  casting  of  salt  and  flour  into  the 
flame,  the  one  in  the  temples,  the  other  on  the  domestic  hearth  or  altar.  The 
more  public  solemnities,  such  as  processions,  hymns,  and  musical  services,  to- 
gether with  the  fasts  and  vigils  appropriated  to  foreign  divinities,  were  gener- 
ally less  familiar  to  the  Roman  ritual 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


201 


rites  of  initiation,  the  tricks  of  the  magicians,  the  pretended 
virtues  of  charms  and  amulets,  the  riddles  of  emblematical 
idolatry,  enshrined  in  the  form  of  brutes  or  monsters  half- 
brute  half-human,  with  which  the  superstitions  of  the  East 
abounded,  amused  the  languid  interests  of  the  voluptuary 
who,  as  has  been  well  remarked,  had  neither  the  energy  for 
a moral  belief,  nor  the  boldness  requisite  for  a logical  scepti- 
cism.1 2 * * * 

While  the  men’s  minds  were  still  too  hardy  to  submit  to 
these  voluptuous  excitements,  the  women  had  thrown  them- 
selves into  them  with  all  the  passionate  self-aban-  ^ Eoman 
donment  of  their  weaker  natures.  Uninstructed,  Batedby?he* 
ill-treated,  half-employed,  yet  vain  of  the  out-  Si^of  the6 *" 
ward  show  of  deference  the  laws  and  habits  of  Eastern  cults’ 
the  age  continued  to  accord  them,  the  Roman  matrons  fol- 
lowed these  frivolous  novelties  with  a fervour  which  scandal- 
ized their  supercilious  lords.  They  rushed  from  the  sordid 
constraint  of  their  lives  at  home  to  the  licentious  freedom  of 
the  veiled  orgy  and  masquerading  procession.  In  them  they 
sought  too  for  spiritual  consolation,  and  they  found,  at  least, 
an  occupation  and  an  interest.8  And  beyond  this  their  im- 
aginations were  kindled  with  ideas  of  communion  with  the 
Deity,  and  exaltation  above  earthly  things,  which  made  them 
the  dupes  of  charlatans,  the  prey  of  ribald  intriguers.  The 
story  of  the  unscrupulous  gallant  who  gained  possession  of 
his  mistress  by  personating  the  god  Anubis  with  the  con- 
nivance and  aid  of  the  priests,  is  one  instance  recorded,  out 
of  many,  no  doubt,  which  have  passed  into  oblivion,  of  the 
crimes  and  injuries  which  vexed  the  souls  of  the  Roman  hus- 

1 Such  is  nearly  the  expression  of  De  Broglie  in  speaking  on  this  subject,  in 
his  TEglise  et  V Empire,  i.  49. 

2 Strabo  may  have  pointed  his  general  remark  on  the  superior  devotion  of 

the  female  sex  from  personal  observation:  aizavreQ  yap  tt}<;  deiaidaipoviae 

a-PXyyovQ  olovrat  rdf  ywainaq'  avrai  6e  nal  rov f avSpaQ  irponaXovvTai  irpog 

Taf  errl  tt’Xeov  depaTzeiag  T&v  0e<yv,  ical  iopra f,  ical  Trorviacpovg’  gtt&viov  <F  el 

rif  avijp  naff  avrov  evpicncerat  tolovtoq. — vii.  3.  p.  297.  See  Lipsius  on 

Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  32. 


202 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


bands.1  Augustus  had  already  banished  the  Egyptian  rites 
from  Rome  ; but  they  triumphed  over  his  decrees.  Tiberius 
repeated  the  same  experiment  on  the  submission  of  their 
devotees ; he  caused  the  temples  of  Isis  to  be  razed,  and 
even,  it  is  said,  executed  her  priests.2  But  the 

which  at  length  . . * . 

prevail  over  the  men  were  now  following  m the  tram  of  the  wo- 
men. The  effeminacy  of  the  times  involved  both 
sexes  in  the  same  vortex  of  superstition ; the  Nile-Gods  con- 
tinued to  fascinate  their  votaries  with  charms  which  could 
not  be  dissolved ; the  idol  of  the  blear-eyed  Egyptian  still 
brandished  the  terrors  of  her  cymbal,  and  threatened  with 
blindness  the  perjurer  of  the  forum.3  The  rites  of  the  Syrian 
Goddess,  if  less  dangerous  than  the  Isiac  to  morals  and  less 
insulting  to  the  majesty  of  the  Roman  household,  were  per- 
haps even  more  degrading.  They  were  more  attractive,  it 
would  seem,  to  the  lower  classes  than  to  the  patrician  rulers 
of  the  state,  and  thereby  escaped  the  same  animadversion. 
The  priests  of  Astarte  roamed  from  village  to  village,  carry- 
ing their  sacred  image  on  an  ass’s  back,  and  at  every  halt 
attracted  the  gaping  rustics  with  the  strains  of  their  flutes, 
danced  in  a circle  round  the  goddess  with  their  hair  dripping 

1 Joseph.  Antiq.  xviii.  3.  A Roman  knight,  Decius  Mundus,  had  tried  in 
vain  to  seduce  Paulina  by  presents  and  flatteries.  One  of  his  female  slaves 
promised  to  gain  him  the  object  of  his  passion,  and  bribed  the  priests  of  Isis, 
whom  Paulina  worshipped.  The  priests  assure  the  devotee  that  Anubis  had 
promised  to  appear  to  her.  She  hastens  delighted  to  the  temple ; the  doors 
are  closed,  the  lights  extinguished,  the  god  reveals  himself  and  demands  fa- 
vours which  she  dares  not  deny.  Mundus  boasts  that  he  has  enjoyed  her  under 
the  semblance  of  the  god.  She  discloses  the  injury  to  her  husband,  who  com- 
plains to  the  emperor  Tiberius.  Mundus  is  banished,  the  priests  crucified,  the 
temple  overthrown. 

2 The  cults  of  Egypt,  with  their  allegorical  monsters  and  hideous  symbols, 
were  peculiarly  hateful  to  the  Romans,  who  regarded  such  superstitions  as  ab- 
normal. But  political  jealousy  contributed  to  this  exceptional  treatment,  for 
they  do  not  seem  to  have  been  always  excluded  from  the  religiones  licitce , or 
licensed  observances. 

3 Juvenal,  xiii.  93. : — 

“ Decernat  quodcunque  volet  de  corpore  nostro 
Isis,  et  irato  feriat  mea  lumina  sistro.” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


203 


with  unguents,  cut  themselves  with  knives  and  swords,  and 
dashed  their  own  blood  around  them,  handing  finally  a cap 
from  rank  to  rank  for  the  pence,  figs,  or  crusts  of  the  admir- 
ing spectators.1  The  obscene  mutilation  of  the  priests  of 
Cybele  excited  still  more  astonishment,  mingled,  no  doubt, 
with  superstitious  terror ; but  though,  as  the  Mother  of  the 
Gods,  she  was  honoured  by  the  Roman  matrons  with  the  sol- 
emn feast  of  the  Megalesia,  the  frantic  asceticism  of  her 
Eastern  devotees  found  probably  no  imitators  among  the 
manlier  sons  of  Italy. 

The  apologists  for  polytheism  had  not  yet  proclaimed 
their  theory  that  all  the  various  gods  of  various  nations  were 
only  diverse  representations  of  the  same  Essen-  , 

J 1 The  time  ar- 

tial  Unity.  They  had  gone  no  further  than  to  rived  for  appre- 

J . dating  the  idea 

countenance  the  politic  interpretations  of  Caesar  of  the  Divine 

i ^ , Unity,  the  es- 

and  Augustus,  who  announced  to  their  Gaulish  sentiai  dogma 
subjects  that  Belenus  and  Teutates  were  merely 
other  names  for  Apollo  and  Mercuiy.  Nevertheless,  amidst 
the  distraction  of  the  religious  sentiment  between  its  thou- 
sands of  devotional  objects,  the  time  had  come  for  some  faint 
and  timid  appreciation  of  the  idea  of  the  Divine  Unity  pre- 
sented by  the  nobler  theology  of  the  Jews.  The  Jewish  re- 
ligion had  come  first  under  the  close  observation  of  the 
Romans  after  the  conquest  of  Palestine  by  Pompeius.  Some 
thousands  of  the  inhabitants  had  been  carried  off  into  slavery, 
and  of  these  a large  proportion,  reserved  perhaps  to  grace 
the  conqueror’s  triumph,  had  been  sold  in  the  Roman  mar- 
kets. Several  princes  of  the  nation  had  been  retained  as 
hostages ; and  these  personages,  who  were  treated  with  great 
show  of  courtesy,  were  allowed,  no  doubt,  the  attendance  of 
clients  of  their  own  race.  The  way  to  the  capital  of  the 
world  was  opened,  and  the  Jews  continued  to  flock  thither 
of  their  own  accord : they  were  impelled  by  their  thirst  of 

1 Lucian,  Lucius,  32.  Apuleius,  Metamorph.  viii.  in  fin.,  describes  these 
proceedings  with  his  usual  animation.  His  scene  is  laid  beyond  the  Adriatic, 
yet  there  seems  no  reason  to  doubt  that  these  ribaldries  were  imported  into 
Italy. 


204 


HISTORY  OP  THE  ROMANS 


lucre  and  their  restless  industry : yet  they  possessed,  as  far 
as  we  know,  no  special  arts  or  aptitude,  like  the  Greeks  or 
Egyptians,  for  making  themselves  necessary  or  acceptable 
visitors  at  the  doors  of  the  native  Italians.  Much  did  the 
Romans  marvel  at  the  swarms  of  these  uncouth  adventurers, 
with  their  deeply-marked  physiognomy,  their  strong  national 
feelings,  their  far-reaching  reminiscences  of  past  glory,  their 
proud  anticipation  of  a more  splendid  future,  their  exclusive 
usages,  their  vacant  fanes,  their  incommunicable  Deity. 
They  thronged  together  in  particular  quarters  of  the  city, 
which  they  almost  made  their  own : 1 their  numbers  soon 
amounted  to  many  thousands,  and  the  turbulence  which  was 
early  remarked  as  characteristic  of  them,  caused  the  senate  to 
regard  them  with  jealousy,  its  orators  to  denounce  them  as 
The  Jews  in  dangerous  subjects.  But  they  were  fortunate  in 
Se™byPthe0&-"st  finding  patrons,  first  in  Caesar  and  afterwards  in 
Caesars.  Augustus,  who  secured  them  the  free  exercise  of 

their  religion,  countenanced  their  assemblies,  made  gifts  to 
their  temple,  and  even  admitted  them  along  with  the  citizens 
of  the  republic  to  a share  in  the  largesses  of  corn.2  If  the 
distribution  took  place  on  their  Sabbath,  the  Jews  were  al- 
lowed to  apply  for  their  share  on  the  day  following.  The 
mysteriousness  of  their  belief,  or  rather,  perhaps,  the  earnest- 
ness of  its  devotees,  exercised  an  extraordinary  influence  on 
the  Roman  mind.  Amidst  many  public  expressions  of  hatred 
and  disgust,  knights  and  senators  still  turned  towards  it  with 
curiosity,  interest,  and  awe.  In  Palestine  rude  centurions 
lowered  their  ensigns  before  its  symbols,  or  built  synagogues 
for  its  worshippers.  In  Rome  the  name  of  its  first  expounder 

1 Philo,  Leg.  ad  Cat.  p.  1014. : T rjv  nkpav  tov  T ifiepeag  irorapov  pzyakrp> 
Tjjc  'P uprjq  cnroTOfigv  . . . Karexo/ievqv  ml  oinovpevTjv  irpog  ’I ovda'iov.  Most 
of  them,  it  is  added,  were  captives  who  had  been  enfranchised,  and  had  become 
Roman  citizens. 

2 Philo,  Leg.  ad  Cai.  p.  1015.  This  is  an  important  fact  for  the  considera- 
tion of  those  who  estimate  the  number  of  the  citizens  from  the  number  of  these 
recipients  of  corn.  According  to  Josephus, — but  allowance  must  be  made  for 
his  spirit  of  exaggeration, — no  less  than  8000  Jews  resident  in  Rome  joined  on 
one  occasion  in  a petition  to  Augustus.  Joseph.  Antiq.  xvii.  11.  1. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


205 


was  held  in  honour ; its  sacred  hooks  were  not  unknown,  the 
glowing  imagery  of  their  poetry  was  studied  and  reproduced. 
Men  and  women,  the  latter  doubtless  the  most  numerously, 
crowded  its  place  of  meeting,  observed  its  holy  days,  and 
respected  its  antique  traditions.  Many,  it  would  Judaism  be. 
seem,  were  admitted  to  some  partial  communion  abS?mongi0th’e 
with  the  Jewish  worshippers  : though  we  do  not  citizen8) 
hear  of  their  submitting  to  the  initiatory  rites,  or  to  the  pecu- 
liar abstinences  of  national  Judaism.  The  foreigner  was  still 
reserved  in  imparting  to  these  converts  the  secrets  of  his 
faith ; and  the  best  informed  of  the  Romans  continued,  to  a 
late  period,  possessed  with  the  notion  that  he  either  had  no 
God  at  all,  or  adored  him  under  a vile  and  bestial  symbol,  or 
possibly  did  not  really  know  what  he  believed  or  wherefore.1 

This  dallying  with  Judaism  was  a fashionable  weakness : 
it  furnished  interest  or  excitement  to  the  dissipated  idlers  to 
whom  Ovid  addressed  his  meretricious  poetry.2  andisintro_ 
To  such  persons  it  was  probably  first  recom-  thefreeSnof 
mended  through  the  medium  of  the  slaves  from  the  Palace- 
Palestine  who  swarmed  in  patrician  households.  The  empe- 
ror’s palace  itself  seems  to  have  been  a nursery  of  Jewish 
usages  and  opinions.  The  Columbaria  of  Claudius,  recently 
discovered,  reveal  a number  of  Hebrew  names  among  the 
imperial  freedmen ; and,  what  is  still  more  remarkable,  many 
are  the  same  names,  albeit  Greek  and  not  Hebrew,  which 
occur  in  the  salutations  of  St.  Paul  to  his  fellow-countrymen 
in  the  capital.3  Assuredly  there  were  in  Caesar's  household 

1 Comp.  Juvenal,  xiv.  97:  “Nil  prater  nubes  et  coeli  numen  adorant.” 
Lucan,  Phars.  ii.  592.:  “Et  dedita  sacris  Incerti  Judaea  Dei.”  Seneca,  quoted 
by  S.  Augustin,  de  Civ.  Dei , vi.  11. : “Major  pars  populi  facit  quod  cur  faciat 
ignorat.”  For  the  symbol,  the  ass’s  head,  see  Tac.  Hist.  v.  4. 

2 Ovid,  Art  Arnand.  i.  416. ; Rem.  Amor.  220. ; Tibull.  i.  3.  18. 

3 I refer  to  Mr.  Lightfoot’s  account  of  the  inscriptions  in  certain  Columbaria 
recently  discovered  at  Rome,  Journal  of  Class.  Philol.  No.  X.  p.  57.  from 
Henzen’s  supplement  to  Orelli’s  Collection.  These  were  receptacles  for  the 
ashes  of  slaves  and  freedmen  of  the  imperial  family.  Some  of  the  names,  as 
Hermas  and  Nereis,  are  connected  with  the  Claudian  gens ; others,  as  Tryphaena 
and  Tryphera,  with  the  Valerian,  that  of  Messalina;  others,  as  Crescens,  Phile- 


206 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


both  slaves  and  freedmen  of  every  race  and  nation  subject  to 
Rome : but  that  the  connexion  between  it  and  Judea  should 
be  more  than  usually  close,  might  be  expected  from  the  fa- 
vour in  which  the  Jews  were  held  by  the  first  emperors,  and 
from  the  intimacy  of  the  imperial  family  with  so  many  Jew- 
ish princes  detained  within  the  precincts  of  the  palace.  Judea, 
under  the  sway  of  the  procurators,  was  governed  directly 
from  the  emperor’s  own  chamber ; in  one  instance  a freedman 
of  the  emperor  administered  its  affairs,  as  his  master’s  private 
property.1  When  we  read  in  the  Jewish  historian  that  Pop- 
paea,  the  murderess  and  adulteress,,  was  a devout  woman , we 
must  suppose  that  she  was  regarded  as  a patroness  by  the 
Jewish  clients  of  Nero’s  household;  in  moments  of  threat- 
ened persecution  she  may  have  befriended  them,  nor  is  it  im- 
probable that  she  admired  their  usages,  humoured  their  prej- 
udices, and  partook  of  the  fashionable  inclination  to  join  in 
their  ceremonies.2 

The  favour  in  which  the  Jews  were  held  by  the  emperor 
was  indeed  precarious.  Beyond  the  walls  of  the  palace,  and 
Turbulence  of  of  other  noble  mansions,  they  were,  as  we  have 
Eomeew  The  said,  generally  disliked ; the  apprehension  which 
fvincesjeab-  their  unquiet  attitude  at  home  continued  more 
ousy  of  them.  anci  more  inspire,  penetrated  to  the  centre  of 
the  Roman  power,  and  even  at  Rome  every  outbreak  of  sul- 
len fierceness  among  them  was  regarded  as  a symptom  of 
national  disaffection.  They  were  accused  not  of  turbulence 
only,  but  of  corrupting  the  minds  of  women;  and  when, 
under  Tiberius,  an  effort,  as  we  have  seen,  was  made  by  the 
government  to  check  the  growing  relaxation  of  female  man- 

tus,  Hymenscus,  are  mentioned  as  Caesar’s  freedmen ; others  again,  viz.  Philolo- 
gus  and  Ampliatus  (Amplias),  occur  independently.  Among  them  are  some 
names  apparently  Jewish,  as  Baricha,  Zabda,  Achiba,  Giddo,  Sabbatis,  all 
Yalerii.  One  at  least,  Sentia  Renata,  seems  to  bespeak  a Christian  baptism. 
Comp.  Romans , c.  xvi. 

1 Felix,  the  favourite  of  Claudius  and  Nero,  was  procurator  of  Judea,  and 
married  to  Drusilla,  the  daughter  of  Agrippa.  Tac.  Hist.  v.  9. 

3 Joseph.  Antiq.  xviii.  V.  11.  The  dancer  Apaturius,  Poppaea’s  favourite, 
was  a Jew. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


207 


ners,  the  Jews  were  marked  out  for  proscription  together 
with  the  Egyptians.  The  priests  of  Isis  had  been  convicted 
of  flagrant  immorality,  and  there  was  a presumed  connex- 
ion, of  origin  if  not  of  character,  between  her  rites  and  those 
of  the  Jewish  divinity.1  Besides  the  disaffection  and  the 
licentiousness  imputed  to  them,  they  disturbed  the  peace  of 
the  city ; for  the  Jews  and  Egyptians  renewed  in  Rome  the 
perpetual  quarrel  of  their  nations  in  Alexandria,  till  they 
provoked  the  police  of  the  streets  to  crush  them  both  to- 
gether. The  rites  of  both  people  were  interdicted,  and  four 
thousand  of  the  free  descendants  of  Jewish  slaves  and  cap- 
tives were  transported  at  once  to  Sardinia,  while  all  the  Jews 
at  Rome  of  free  origin  were  required  to  quit  the  shores  of 
Italy,  or  abjure  their  profane  superstition .a  It  would  seem, 
however,  that  the  latter  part,  at  least,  of  this  severe  edict 
was  not  strictly  executed.  The  Jews  bowed  to  the  storm, 
conformed  perhaps  for  a time,  but  soon  returned  to  their  old 
quarters  and  renewed  their  old  practices.  Those  who  were 
attached  to  the  magnates  of  the  city  found,  no  doubt,  power- 
ful protectors.  They  celebrated  the  birthday  of  their  de- 
ceased king,  and  adored  him  as  a god  with  pomp  and  fer- 
vour, to  avert  perhaps  the  jealousy  of  the  government,  to 
which  the  worship  of  Jehovah  seemed  a bond  of  more  dan- 
gerous sympathy.3 

1 The  ancient  emigration  of  the  Jews  from  Egypt  was  known,  though  under 
strange  disfigurements,  to  the  Romans  (Tac.  Hist.  v.  3.) ; the  influence  of  the 
Jewish  race  in  Alexandria  was  also  notorious ; and  the  Jews  in  Rome  spoke 
probably  the  same  dialect  of  Greek  as  their  brethren  in  Egypt.  We  may  pre- 
sume, moreover,  that  they  had  imbibed  from  the  Alexandrians,  or  imparted  to 
them,  many  religious  as  well  as  social  usages.  The  linen  robes  and  fillets  com- 
mon to  the  priesthoods  both  of  Jerusalem  and  Alexandria  seemed  to  connect 
them  with  one  another,  and  were  a conspicuous  point  of  difference  between 
them  and  the  priesthoods  ol  Greece  and  Rome.  Thus  Lucan,  with  a distinctive 
epithet,  “Linigerum  placidis  compellat  Achorea  dictis,”  x.  175. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  ii.  85. ; Suet.  Tib.  36. ; Joseph.  Antiq.  xviii.  3.  5.  See  above, 
chapter  xliv. 

3 This  is  the  interpretation  which  Salvador,  I think  justly,  puts  upon  the 
lines  of  Persius,  Sat.  v.  180. : — 

“ At  cum 

Herodis  venere  dies,  unctaque  fenestra 


208 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


Thus  at  Rome,  as  well  as  in  their  own  country,  the  Jewish 
people  were  divided  into  two  classes  or  factions,  of  which  the 
The  Jews  at  one  retained  the  zeal  and  cherished  the  aspira- 
SeSowVcoun-  ti°ns  of  its  national  heroes,  the  other,  more 
into twofac-  courtly  and  discreet,  yielded  to  the  moral  influ- 

tions.  ence  0f  conquerors,  and  was  content  to  ex- 

change the  subjection  of  its  native  land  for  its  own  personal 
advantage.  While  the  slaves  of  the  Palatine  acquiesced 
with  a complacent  smile  in  their  gilded  servitude,  the  artifi- 
cers and  chapmen  of  the  Transtiberine,  and  the  pedlars  of  the 
Egerian  valley,  were  agitated  year  by  year  with  rumours  of* 
new  Messiahs  appearing  in  the  streets  of  Jerusalem  or  on  the 
slopes  of  the  wilderness,  and  drawing  after  them  excited 
multitudes,  till  their  career  was  rudely  intercepted  by  the 
Roman  sword.  The  direct  establishment  of  the  Roman 
power  in  Palestine  by  Claudius,  following  so  soon  upon  the 
brutal  attack  on  the  Jewish  faith  by  Caius,  seems  to  have 
driven  this  frantic  populace  of  J udea  to  a succession  of  des- 
perate outbreaks.  Among  the  J ewish  sojourners  in  foreign 
cities,  connected  as  they  were  by  constant  intercourse  with 
their  native  land,  the  same  restless  feeling  was  speedily 
manifested.  It  is  thus  that  we  can  best  explain  the  hasty 
notice  of  Suetonius,  when  he  states  that  Claudius  once  more 
expelled  the  Jews  from  Rome,  on  account  of  their  repeated 
riots  at  the  instigation  of  a certain  Chrestus.1  This  name,  as 
is  well  known,  was  a form  of  the  title  Christus,  the  anointed 
Messiah,  familiar  to  the  Romans  and  derived  from  the  Hellen- 
istic Jews  themselves,  and  was  the  watchword,  no  doubt,  of 
the  disturbers  of  peace  in  the  city,  who  looked,  at  every  fresh 
arrival  of  exciting  news  from  home,  for  a divine  manifesta* 


Dispositae  pinguem  nebulam  vomuere  lucernas  . . . 

Labra  moves  tacitus,  recutitaque  Sabbata  palles.” 

Herod  Agrippa  was  dead  some  years  before  these  lines  were  written : the 
homage  or  worship  was  paid  to  his  memory. 

1 Suet.  Claud.  25. : “ Judaeos  impulsore  Chresto  assidue  tumultuantes  Roma 
expulit.”  Tertullian  (Apol.  3.)  and  Lactantius  (Inst.  i.  4.  7.,  iv.  V.  5.)  explain 
this  word  as  a metonym  for  Christ,  signifying  just  or  good. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


209 


tion  in  favour  of  the  kingdom  of  Jehovah.1  The  scarcity 
which  befell  the  city  as  well  as  the  provinces  at  this  period 
might  furnish  a further  motive  for  an  act  of  prudential  sever- 
ity. It  was  manifestly  expedient  to  remove  from  the  midst 
of  the  needy  populace  of  the  forum  the  most  fierce  and  tur- 
bulent of  their  fellow-subjects.  With  the  return  of  better 
times  the  Jews  returned  also;  but  meanwhile  the  proscrip- 
tion would  again  have  been  partial  only ; the  Herodians, 
under  the  shelter  of  noble  houses,  would  shrink  from  the  gen- 
eral persecution,  and  repudiate,  no  doubt,  with  earnest  pro- 
testations, the  crimes  and  follies  of  the  zealots. 

Not  that  the  luxurious  dependants  of  the  Roman  nobles 
were  themselves  unmoved  amidst  the  universal  ferment  of  Jew- 
ish opinion.  They  were  vain  of  their  own  posi-  SpiritUai  pride 
tion,  and  of  the  influence  they  had  attained  over  freedmen^tsh 
their  masters ; they  were  proud  of  the  number  of  Eome- 
fellow-slaves  or  freedmen,  for  the  most  part  refined  and  intel- 
ligent Greeks,  who  sate  at  their  feet  to  hear  their  ancient 
lore,  and  drank  in  with  warmed  imaginations  the  wonders  of 
the  Law,  and  the  splendid  promises  of  the  Prophets.  God, 
they  believed,  still  spake  by  their  mouths ; exiles  and  out- 
casts as  they  were,  they  were  still  the  depositaries  of  His 
oracles ; in  the  power  of  their  own  eloquence  they  felt  the 
yet  unexhausted  power  of  a living  faith  in  Jehovah.  They 
were  convinced  that  there  was  still  a future  before  them,  a 
future  of  glory  and  spiritual  empire ; though  they  sought  in 
vain  to  penetrate  the  designs  of  Providence,  and  scan  the 
process  through  which  it  was  to  be  developed.  They  too 
had  heard  of  a Christ  here  and  a Christ  there ; but  they  had 
no  hope  of  a temporal  deliverance,  and  the  destruction  of 

1 We  know  the  time  and  place  where  the  believers  in  Jesus  were  first  called 
Christians  ( Acts , xi.  26.  xPWar>LCaii  “received  the  title,  already  popularly 
known,  of  Christians”) ; but  this  does  not  show  that  the  followers  of  false 
Christs  had  not  received  the  name  before,  or  that  the  name  was  not  commonly 
given  to  both  by  the  heathens  without  discrimination.  For  the  false  Christs, 
see  the  commentators  on  S.  Matth.  xxiv.  24.  ^ evdoxpioro t,  and  Joseph.  Antiq. 
xviii.  1.  1.  on  Judas  the  Gaulonite,  and  xx.  6.  1.  on  Theudas.  Comp,  for  the 
Jewish  view  of  the  subject,  Salvador,  Domin.  Rom.  en  Judee , i.  435. 

VOL  vi. — 14 


210 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


each  pretended  Messiah  was  a relief  to  them  rather  than  a 
disappointment.  It  was  to  minds  thus  prepared  that  the 
message  of  Jesus,  the  true  Christ,  the  spiritual  king  of  the 
Jetvs,  was  announced.  Among  the  many  deliverers  who  had 
risen  and  fallen,  one  alone,  it  was  declared,  had  risen  again  : 
crucified,  dead  and  buried,  He  had  been  raised  from  the 
grave  by  the  hand  of  the  Almighty. 

On  the  first  succeeding  Pentecost  after  this  awful  fact  was 
reported  to  have  occurred,  the  doctrines  and  pretensions  of 
Reception  of  the  disciples  of  this  risen  Jesus  had  been  pro- 

a^Sngath4y  pounded  to  a concourse  of  J ews  and  proselytes, 

andthei/prose-  assembled  at  Jerusalem  from  all  quarters  of  the 
lytes.  world.  Sojourners  at  Pome  had  returned  there 

full  of  the  solemn  tidings,  and  from  that  time  the  peculiar 
character  of  the  new  revelation,  as  the  announcement  of  a 
spiritual,  not  a temporal  deliverance,  had  been  circulated 
from  mouth  to  mouth  among  the  Jews  of  the  capital.  By 
some  among  them  such  a view,  as  we  have  seen,  might  be 
entertained  with  favour,  though  by  others  it  would  be  abhor- 
red as  treason  to  the  national  cause.  At  first,  however,  there 
would  be  no  question,  in  any  quarter,  of  the  abandonment  of 
ancient  rites  and  usages.  If  a few  more  ardent  or  more  ten- 
der spirits  were  at  once  captivated  by  the  first  shadowing 
forth  of  true  Christian  liberty,  they  would  not  dream  as  yet 
of  seceding  from  the  rest  on  matters  of  religious  discipline. 
They  would  join  with  their  brethren  in  urging  upon  their 
foreign  proselytes  that  entire  submission  to  the  Hebrew  law 
which  was  demanded,  not  often  successfully,  by  the  strictest 
adherents  of  the  old  belief.  Again,  year  by  year,  visitors 
from  this  Jewish  society  would  arrive  at  Jerusalem,  and  from 
them  the  Christian  Church,  now  beginning  to  take  a specific 
form  in  the  place  of  its  origin,  would  learn  that  a small  knot 
of  inquirers  in  the  distant  capital  had  accepted  their  an- 
nouncement of  the  Messiahship  of  Jesus,  and  were  ripe  for 
further  instruction  in  the  mysteries  of  his  faith.  At  last,  in 
the  fulness  of  time,  the  greatest  of  their  teachers,  Paul,  the 
eloquent  and  the  learned,  addressed  this  little  flock  in  a letter  of 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


211 


spiritual  admonition,  which,  laid,  in  fact,  the  real  foundation 
of  Christianity  in  Rome.  Now,  supposing  the  special  appii- 
people  to  whom  this  missive  was  directed  to  he,  Sent  of 
as  I have  here  represented  them,  J ews  and  Greeks,  ?a]£es 
retainers  of  aristocratic  households,  clients,  for  in-  10  the  Eoman3* 
stance,  of  the  great  Narcissus  and  even  of  the  emperor  him- 
self, to  none  could  the  warning  with  which  it  commences,  of 
the  fearful  depths  of  vice  to  which  heathenism  had  fallen, 
have  been  more  peculiarly  appropriate.  On  none  could  the 
general  scope  of  its  argument,  that  the  Gospel  was  given  to 
the  Jews  first,  the  teachers,  and  next  to  the  Greeks,  the  prose- 
lytes, of  the  Roman  synagogue,  tell  with  greater  effect.  That 
circumcision  was  not  essential,  that  the  works  of  the  law; 
were  ineffectual,  that  faith  and  grace  are  the  foundations  of 
a true  Christian  calling, — such  would  be  the  topics  upper- 
most in  the  mind  of  a preacher  to  thoughtful  and  perplexed 
believers,  anxious  to  conform  to  the  old  ways  in  all  things, 
but  unable  to  enforce  conformity  upon  their  foreign  adher- 
ents. And  lastly,  the  exhortation  to  remain  subject  to  the 
higher  powers  would  speak  with  emphasis  to  that  class  among 
the  Jews  who  had  hitherto  kept  aloof  from  the  intrigues  of 
their  impatient  countrymen,  and  proclaimed  themselves  obe- 
dient in  everything,  first  to  their  own  patrons  and  masters, 
and  next  to  the  political  authorities  under  which  they  lived.1 
The  Epistle  to  the  Romans  is,  I conceive,  especially  address- 
ed to  the  godly  few  of  that  patrician  following,  half  Jew, 
half  Grecian,  who  were  feeling  their  way  still  timidly  and 
doubtfully  to  belief  in  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  the  son  of  God, 
the  true  Messiah,  the  founder  of  the  spiritual  kingdom  of 
Israel.2 

1 Romans , i.  8.  foil.,  i.  16.,  iii.  25.  foil.,  xiii.  1.  foil.  “They  that  are  of  the 
household  of  Narcissus”  (xvi.  11.)  are  mentioned  along  with  the  others  of  whom 
so  many  appear  to  have  been  “ of  Caesar’s  household.”  It  is  reasonable  to  infer 
that  this  Narcissus  is  the  favourite  of  Claudius. 

2 On  this  supposition  the  remarkable  compliment,  if  I may  so  call  it,  to  this 
congregation,  that  their  faith  was  spoken  of  throughout  the  world  (Rom.  i.  8.), 
receives  an  apt  explanation.  The  disposition  of  these  conspicuous  freedmen 
towards  Christianity  would  be  reported  to  the  family  of  the  procurator  in  Judea, 


212 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


This  epistle,  written  in  the  East  in  the  year  811  (a.  d.  58), 
was  followed,  after  an  interval,  perhaps,  of  three  years,  by 
the  arrival  of  the  apostle  himself  at  Rome.  He 

Arrival  of  St.  . r . 

Paul  in  Pvome.  came  m bonds.  He  had  been  seized  and  nearly 
a.  d.  6i.  killed  by  his  countrymen  at  J erusalem,  for  preach- 

ing the  true  Messiah.  He  had  been  accused  by 
them  to  the  Romans  as  a mover  of  sedition.  But  he  had 
proclaimed  himself  a Roman  citizen,  had  appealed  to  Caesar, 
and,  though  brought  as  a prisoner  to  the  imperial  tribunal, 
he  came  under  the  protection  of  the  government.1  At  Rome, 
he  avowed,  no  doubt,  his  real  character  as  a teacher  of  a 
harmless  doctrine,  already  known,  and  not  unfavourably,  in 
*dhe  highest  quarters ; and  though  long  detained  untried, 
through  the  indolence,  probably,  of  the  emperor,  he  suffered 
no  other  inconvenience.  He  was  guarded  by  the  praetorians 
within  the  precincts  of  the  palace,  lodged  in  a hired  cabin  at- 
tached, it  may  be  supposed,  to  its  outer  courts,  such  as  those 
commonly  occupied  by  the  retainers  of  a noble  patron  ; free 
access  to  him  was  allowed  to  his  compatriots  and  co-religion- 
ists, and  for  two  years  he  was  employed  in  preaching  and  ex- 
tending the  faith  even  among  the  members  of  Caesar’s  house- 
hold.2 Of  the  perfect  security  with  which  the  Gospel  of  the 

and  thence  would  doubtless  be  published  abroad  as  an  important  fact  among 
the  Jews  and  Christians  everywhere. 

1 The  exact  dates  of  these  events  are  not  important  to  this  history,  and  I do 
not  mean  to  express  a decided  opinion  about  them.  I have  followed  the  opin- 
ions which  seemed  to  me  on  the  whole  the  best  supported. 

2 The  phrase  in  Phil.  i.  13.,  kv  ofap  t(S  xpaiTupi^  as  is  well  known,  has 
been  diversely  interpreted,  of  the  emperor’s  palace,  and  of  the  camp  of  the  prae- 
torians. I incline  to  the  former  interpretation.  St.  Paul,  we  must  remember, 
speaks  as  a foreigner.  In  the  provinces  the  emperor  was  known,  not  as  Prin- 
ceps,  but  as  Imperator.  In  Judea,  governed  more  immediately  by  him  through 
the  imperial  procurators,  he  would  be  more  exclusively  regarded  as  a military 
chief.  The  soldier,  to  whom  the  apostle  was  attached  with  a chain,  would 
speak  of  him  as  his  general.  When  Paul  asked  the  centurion  in  charge  of  him, 

“ Where  shall  I be  confined  in  Rome  ? ” the  answer  would  be,  “ In  the  praeto- 
rium,”  or  the  quarters  of  the  general.  When  led,  as  perhaps  he  was,  before  the 
emperor’s  tribunal,  if  he  asked  the  attending  guards,  “ Where  am  I ? ” again 
they  would  reply,  “ In  the  praetorium.”  The  emperor  was  protected  in  his 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


213 


true  Christ  was  professed  at  this  time  at  Rome  there  can  he 
no  question.  To  account  for  it  some  have  supposed  an  inti- 
macy between  Paul  and  the  prefect  Burrhus,  or  the  minister 
Seneca,  and  the  writings  of  the  apostle  and  the  philosopher 
present  certainly  some  striking  points  of  apparent  sympathy. 
At  a later  period  it  was  gravely  asserted  among  the  new 
sect,  that  Tiberius,  on  the  official  statements  of  Pontius  Pi- 
late, had  acknowledged  the  divinity  of  the  culprit  whom  the 
procurator  had  crucified,  and  had  demanded  divine  honours 
from  the  senate  for  the  F ounder  of  Christianity.  These  the 
senate,  it  was  said,  declined  to  sanction:  the  emperor,  how- 
ever, insisted  that  the  Christians  should  be  allowed  at  least  a 
full  toleration.1  The  story  itself,  as  told  by  Tertullian,  is 
probably  groundless  throughout ; but  it  shows  at  least,  and 
such  is  the  purpose  for  which  Tertullian  cites  it,  that  the  early 
indulgence  of  the  government  to  Christianity  was  an  admit- 
ted fact  which  challenged  explanation.  Whatever  may  be 
the  value  of  these  traditions,  the  opposition  in  which  the  true 

palace  by  a body-guard,  lodged  in  its  courts  and  standing  sentry  at  its  gates : 
and  accordingly  they  received  the  name  of  “ praetorians.”  After  the  establish- 
ment of  a camp  for  his  body-guard  outside  the  city,  a cohort  was  still  kept  al- 
ways in  attendance  on  the  emperor’s  person,  and  in  his  principal  residence,  and 
this  accordingly  in  military  language  continued,  I conceive,  to  bear  the  title 
familiar  to  the  soldiers.  The  palace,  like  other  patrician  mansions,  was  sur- 
rounded by  numerous  cabins,  tenanted  by  the  retainers  of  the  great  man  him- 
self, and  in  one  of  these,  as  “ a hired  house,”  the  apostle  was  permitted  to 
dwell,  from  the  favour,  perhaps  in  which  his  nation  was  held,  instead  of  being 
cast  into  the  vaults  beneath  the  palace  floors. 

1 TertulL  Apol.  5. : “ Tiberius  ....  annunciatum  sibi  ex  Syria  Palaestina 
quod  illic  veritatem  illius  divinitatis  revelaverat,  detulit  ad  Senatum  cum  prgero- 
gativa  suffragii  sui.  Senatus,  quia  non  ipse  probaverat,  respuit.  Caesar  in  sen- 
tentia  mansit,  comminatus  periculum  acccusatoribus  Christianorum.”  This 
strange  story  has  been  generally  rejected  as  incredible  by  the  best  critics  and 
historians.  It  may  be  remarked,  however,  that  the  official  minute  of  our  Lord’s 
trial  and  sentence  was  no  doubt  transmitted  by  the  procurator  to  the  emperor, 
and  was  deposited  in  the  archives  at  Rome.  It  was  hence  perhaps  that  Tacitus 
was  able  to  speak  so  pointedly  of  the  execution  of  Christ  by  Pontius  Pilate : 
“Auctor  nominis  ejus  Christus,  Tiberio  imperitante,  per  procuratorem  Pontium 
Piletum  supplieio  affectus  erat ."—Ann.  xv.  44. 


214 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


believers  stood  to  the  assertors  of  false  and  temporal  Mes- 
siahs would  be  alone  a sufficient  motive  for  the  favour  they 
manifestly  received. 

Nevertheless,  there  is  no  ground  for  supposing  that,  under 
the  shelter  of  this  indulgence,  the  young  disciples  shunned 
story  of  Pom-  the  genuine  practice  of  their  profession,  or  walk- 
i^Xstmiarf  ed  unworthily  of  their  spiritual  hopes.  The  faint 
of  theS^f  traces  left  us  by  history  may  suggest  a pleasing 
conTerts.  picture  to  the  imagination  of  the  life  and  conver- 
sation of  the  first  Christians  at  Rome,  that  little  band  of 
earnest  and  spiritual  converts,  first  exploring  by  the  light  of 
conscience  the  rudiments  of  the  new  doctrine,  then  receiving 
clearer  instruction  from  the  letters,  and  lastly  from  the  mouth 
of  the  inspired  apostle,  strengthened  by  his  presence,  inflam- 
ed by  his  zeal,  reasoning  ardently  with  the  more  timid  of 
their  brethren,  gradually  overcoming  the  scruples  of  some, 
bearing  with  the  prejudices  of  others,  suffering  patiently  the 
scorn  of  the  proud  and  worldly  with  whom  they  mingled, 
and  presenting  to  their  curious  visitors  from  surrounding 
Paganism  the  first  and  purest  example  of  zeal  beautified  by 
charity.  Some  minds  there  were  at  Rome  which  shrank 
with  a rebound  from  the  grosser  forms  of  corruption  thrust 
everywhere  upon  them ; some  which  were  softened  to  feel- 
ings of  humanity  by  the  general  ease  and  tranquillity  of  the 
times ; some,  again,  which  warmed  with  spiritual  emotions 
under  the  fervent  teaching  of  virtuous  philosophers  : even  in 
that  sink  of  vice,  under  the  flaunting  banners  of  lust  and 
cruelty,  there  was  a preparation  at  work  for  the  reception  of 
Gospel  truth,  and  the  plain  preaching  of  St.  Paul  was  more 
attractive  perhaps  to  many  than  the  strange  rites  and  mys- 
teries of  the  Jewish  synagogue.  But  the  apostle  preached  to 
his  disciples  in  bonds , and  of  the  multitudes  who  came  to 
hear  him,  no  man  forbidding  him , the  true  children  of  Rome 
were  themselves  still  under  constraint  of  pride  and  prejudice, 
and  dependent  on  the  idols  of  society  around  them,  from 
which  few,  perhaps,  could  wholly  escape.  Jews  and  Greeks 
might  submit  to  the  yoke  of  a crucified  Redeemer,  but  con- 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


215 


version  among  the  native  Italians  was  as  yet  rare  and  imper- 
fect.1 To  renounce  a world  with  which  it  might  seem  impos- 
sible to  mingle  without  defilement,  rather  than  seek  by  active 
labours  to  purify  it,  would  be  the  refuge  of  the  grave  and 
gloomy  spirits  which  really  broke  through  the  restraints  of 
law  and  custom  to  join  themselves  to  a divine  Saviour.  The 
story  of  Pomponia  Graecina,  supposed  by  many  to  have  been 
one  of  these  Roman  believers,  may  be  taken  at  least  in  illus- 
tration of  the  form  which  belief  might  be  expected  to  assume 
among  a reserved  and  sensitive  people,  disdaining  the  spirit 
of  proselytism,  and  ashamed  to  the  last  of  rejecting  their 
domestic  and  national  ideas.  This  noble  matron,  the  wife  of 
Aulus  Plautius,  the  conqueror  of  Britain,  was,  it  seems,  de- 
nounced to  the  emperor  as  guilty  of  a foreign  superstition  ; 
a charge  implying  not  merely  participation  in  the  rites  of  a 
licensed  religion,  but  abandonment  of  the  national  worship, 
such  as  Christianity  perhaps  alone  then  demanded  of  its  vo- 
taries.2 Rero,  from  respect  for  a brave  and  loyal  officer,  or 

1 A great  proportion  of  the  converts  greeted  by  St.  Paul  in  the  last  chapter 
to  the  Romans  bear  Greek  names.  They  may  have  been  Jews  or  other  foreign- 
ers, but  assuredly  not  Romans  by  birth.  The  same  was  probably  the  case  of 
those  with  Latin  names  also.  Mr.  Williams’s  attempt  to  identify  the  Pudens 
and  Claudia  of  Martial  (iv.  13.,  xi.  56.)  with  the  converts  mentioned  by  St.  Paul 
(2  Tim.- iv.  21.)  is  interesting;  but  we  must  not  forget — 1.  that  both  these 
names  are  very  common  at  the  period : 2.  that  the  name  of  Pudens  in  the 
Chichester  inscription  is  only  conjectural : 3.  that  the  character  Martial  gives 
of  Pudens  is  painfully  inconsistent  with  the  Christian  profession.  The  Claudia 
of  Martial  was,  he  says,  of  British  extraction.  In  our  island,  as  in  Gaul,  many 
chiefs  were  enrolled  no  doubt  in  the  imperial  gens,  and  it  is  idle  to  assign  this 
lady  to  any  one  British  family  in  particular.  At  all  events,  the  notion  of  Cam- 
den and  Fuller,  that  she  was  a daughter  of  Caractacus  domiciled  in  Rome, 
seems  as  plausible  as  that  which  derives  her  from  Tib.  Claudius  Cogidubnus, 
the  king  of  the  Regni  in  Sussex.  See,  however,  Williams’s  Essay  on  Pudens , 
&c.,  or  an  abstract  of  his  arguments  in  Alford’s  Greek  Test.  iii.  104. 

2 Such,  no  doubt,  should  in  strictness  have  been  the  demand  of  Judaism 
also  : but  there  is  ample  evidence  of  the  compromise  which  the  Jews  generally 
allowed  to  their  half-attached  followers  and  admirers.  Herod,  for  instance, 
made  no  doubt  conditions  with  them,  like  Naaman  the  Syrian,  who  stipulated 
that  he  should  be  allowed  to  bow,  when  he  stood  with  his  master  in  the  temple 
of  Rimmon.  2 Kings,  v.  18. 


216 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMAXS 


possibly  from  a feeling  of  indulgence,  as  above  explained, 
towards  the  new  sect,  refused  to  entertain  the  accusation 
himself,  and  referred  it  to  the  domestic  tribunal  of  the  hus- 
band and  his  kinsmen.  Pomponia  was  examined  by  lenient 
judges,  and  by  their  tenderness,  their  ignorance,  or  their  in- 
difference, was  suffered  to  escape  unpunished.  But  it  was 
remarked  with  awe  by  the  frivolous  society  around  her,  that 
she  withdrew  from  all  conversation  with  them,  shrank  into 
the  secret  companionship  of  her  own  pensive  meditations, 
and  passed  the  rest  of  her  life,  which  was  prolonged  many 
years,  in  reserve  and  retirement.  Such,  it  would  seem,  were 
the  effects,  most  foreign  to  the  spirit  of  the  age,  which  might 
be  expected  from  conversion  to  Christianity  in  a noble  ma- 
tron of  Rome.1 

St.  Paul  was  kept  under  restraint  for  at  least  two  years, 
but  soon  after  that  period  was  set  at  liberty  ; a further  tes 
Outburst  0f  the  timony,  it  would  appear,  to  the  acknowledged  in- 
persecution.  offensiveness  of  his  sect.2  Yet  in  little  more  than 
another  year  we  read  with  surprise  of  the  sudden  persecution 
directed  against  it  by  Nero,  and  we  hear  that  he  was  induced 
to  denounce  the  Christians  as  the  authors  of  the  conflagra- 
tion, to  propitate  the  popular  feeling ; for  none  others  were 
so  detested  for  their  strange  and  mischievous  superstition,  or 
so  generally  held  guilty  of  the  most  abominable  crimes , of 
the  crime,  indeed,  of  hatred  towards  the  whole  human  race.9 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  32.  (a.  u.  810):  “ Superstitionis  extern®  rea an  expres- 
sion which  has  been  very  generally  interpreted  of  conversion  to  Christianity. 
See  Lardner,  Testimonies , i.  344.  The  Romans,  indeed,  ascribed  Pomponia’s 
long  melancholy  to  grief  for  the  murder  of  Julia  by  Messalina,  fourteen  years 
earlier.  Tac.  1.  c. ; Dion  lx.  18.  It  seems  not  unreasonable  to  suppose  that 
sorrow  turned  her  mind  to  spiritual  consolations. 

2 That  the  apostle  was  detained  at  Rome  for  two  years  appears  from  the 
conclusion  of  the  Ads.  His  release  is  presumed  on  the  authority  of  tradition 
embodied  in  the  early  church  histories,  and  supported  inferentially  by  the  Epis- 
tles. Supposing  him  to  have  reached  Rome  early  in  814  (a.  d.  61),  he  may 
have  quitted  it  again  in  816,  the  year  before  the  persecution. 

3 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  44.:  “Per  flagitia  invisos  ....  odio  generis  humani 
....  sontes  et  novissima  supplicia  meritos.”  Suet.  Ner.  16.:  “Genus 

hominum  superstitionis  novae  et  malefic®.” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


217 


The  horror  of  the  sacrifice  will  be  enhanced  if  we  consider 
the  position  and  character  of  its  victims,  such  as  I have  rep- 
resented them.  They  were  not  a base  and  turbulent  rabble 
like  the  mass  of  the  Jewish  residents,  who  had  been  more 
than  once  swept  away  by  general  edicts  of  exile  or  deporta- 
tion ; but  a mixed  company  of  Greeks  and  Romans,  as  well 
as  Jews,  some  well-born,  all  perhaps  instructed  and  accom- 
plished, capable  of  appreciating  the  refined  intelligence  of 
the  Apostle,  all  trained  by  habit,  as  well  as  by  principle,  to 
obey  the  laws,  and  respect  the  usages  of  those  around  them. 
Not  only  were  men  and  women  of  gentle  nature  put  to  the 
most  cruel  of  deaths, — not  only  was  mockery  added  to  their 
pangs, — but  the  process  against  them  seems  to  have  been 
more  summary  and  informal  than  we  read  of  in  the  persecu- 
tions of  later  times.1 

Critical  readers  have,  I believe,  often  felt  a difficulty  in 
accepting  the  plain  assertions  of  Tacitus  and  Suetonius  on 
this  subject.  They  have  remarked  that  there  is 

J J Difficulty  of 

nothing  in  the  known  habits  and  teaching  of  early  accounting  for 

. . p , _ this  supposed 

Christianity  to  account  tor  such  mlatuated  ha-  persecution  of 
tred.  If  here  and  there  a patrician  convert  vex- 
ed his  kinsmen  by  withholding  the  domestic  offering,  such 
cases  were  at  least  extremely  rare,  nor  would  they  be  noticed 
by  the  vulgar,  whose  clamours  alone  are  recorded.  The 
usages  of  the  disciples  were  indeterminate  in  their  outward 
form  ; their  tenets  were  mostly  subjective  ; there  was  little 
in  either  that  could  openly  clash  with  popular  prejudices. 
The  first  Christians  at  Rome  did  not  separate  themselves 
from  the  heathens,  nor  renounce  their  ordinary  callings ; they 


1 This  may  be  inferred,  I think,  from  the  words  of  Tacitus,  compared  with 
later  accounts  of  the  punctilious  observance  of  form  in  the  proceedings  against 
the  Christians.  It  was  only  towards  the  end  of  the  last  and  worst  of  the  perse- 
cutions, that  of  Diocletian,  according  to  their  own  confession,  that  punishment 
was  summarily  inflicted.  See  Ruinart,  praef.  in  Act.  Martyr,  p.  xxix.,  from 
Eusebius.  Up  to  that  time  every  judicial  sentence  had  been  formally  register- 
ed, and  Christian  inquirers,  when  they  found  these  fewer  than  they  had  expect* 
ed,  declared  that  the  registers  had  been  tampered  with.  Comp.  Prudentius, 
Peristeph.  i.  75 : “Chartulas  blasphemus  olim  nam  satelles  abstulit.” 


218 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


intermarried  with  unbelievers,  nor  even  in  their  unions  with 
one  another  did  they  reject  the  ordinary  forms  of  law.1  It 
would  seem  that  they  burnt  their  dead  after  the  Roman 
fashion,  gathered  their  ashes  into  the  sepulchres  of  their 
patrons,  and  inscribed  over  them  the  customary  dedication 
to  the  Divine  Spirits?  They  wore  no  distinctive  garb  like 
the  professors  of  philosophy ; they  continued  to  dwell  in  the 
midst  of  their  unconverted  countrymen,  frequented  their  syn- 
agogues and  respected  their  sabbaths,  at  the  same  time  that 
they  paid  special  honour  to  the  day  which  followed  the  sab- 
bath, as  the  day  of  their  Lord’s  resurrection.  Before  St. 
Paul  came  among  them  they  can  hardly  have  had  a ministry, 
nor  can  we  speak  with  certainty  of  any  definite  provision 
being  made  even  by  him  at  Rome  for  this  distinctive  badge 
of  an  independent  religion.  Christianity  with  them  was 
eminently  a doctrine  rather  than  a ceremonial.  They  invest- 
ed, indeed,  with  mysterious  significance  their  rites  of  Initia- 
tion and  Communion  ; and  in  the  typical  language  in  which 
the  meaning  of  these  sacraments  was  shrouded  the  heathens 
might  find  a motive  for  jealousy.3  Nevertheless,  such  mys- 
teries were  common  to  the  pagan  cults  also,  and  the  miscon- 
struction eventually  put  on  them  in  the  case  of  the  Chris- 
tians was  the  consequence,  perhaps,  rather  than  the  cause, 
of  the  odium  in  which  the  sect  came  itself  to  be  held.4 

1 Mixed  marriages  were  denounced  by  Tertullian  and  Cyprian ; but  not,  as 
far  as  we  know,  earlier.  The  ceremonial  of  Christian  marriage,  the  espousals, 
the  ring,  and  other  particulars,  are  derived  from  heathen  usage,  nor  is  there  any 
trace  of  a special  church  service  in  primitive  times.  The  passage  from  Tertul- 
lian, ad  Uxor.  ii.  8,  9.,  proves  nothing  to  the  contrary.  Christians  made  it  a 
matter  of  conscience  to  obtain  the  consent  and  blessing  of  the  bishop. 

2 Such  is  the  interpretation  which,  it  seems,  must  be  given  to  the  letters  D. 
M.  (dis  manibus),  which  occur  so  frequently  on  the  tombs  of  the  early  Chris- 
tians at  Rome.  See  Muratori  in  the  Roman  Acad.  Archeol.  xiii.  39.  foil.  (Light- 
foot,  1.  c.) 

3 As  regards  the  Eucharist  at  least,  the  language  of  the  Christian  liturgies, 
which  the  further  we  inquire  seem  to  remount  higher  in  primitive  antiquity,  is 
more  decided  and  uniform  than  that  of  the  fathers. 

4 We  do  not  know  when  the  notorious  calumnies  against  the  Christian  love- 
feasts  were  first  propounded : but  they  are  first  referred  to  by  the  apologists  in 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


219 


The  precipitate  harshness,  indeed,  with  which  men  and 
women  of  the  world  have  judged  the  spirit  of  devotion  in 
modern  times,  the  sourness,  the  self-righteous-  Christianity 
ness,  the  hypocrisy  they  have  ascribed  to  it,  may 
indicate  to  us  the  feeling  with  which  such  of  the 
Romans  as  came  personally  in  contact  with  this  ro- 
saintly  community  might  regard  its  character  and  habits. 
They  would  express,  no  doubt  more  openly  than  our  milder 
manners  allow,  their  wonder,  their  vexation,  and  their  scorn. 
But  the  atrocious  language  of  Tacitus  and  Suetonius  far 
transcends  this  limit,  and  we  are  lost  in  wonder  at  the  charge 
of  firing  the  city,  with  the  general  imputation  of  hating  all 
mankind,  against  a sect  so  unobtrusive  as  well  as  so  innocent. 
Nor  can  we  fail  to  remark  how  short  a time  is  allowed  by 
our  accounts  for  the  growth  of  this  hostile  feeling.  TJp  to 
the  arrival  of  St.  Paul  the  Christians  form  evidently  an  ob- 
scure and  unorganized  society ; within  three  years  from  that 
date  the  whole  city  is  filled  with  inveterate  detestation  of 
them.  This  is  the  more  strange  when  we  observe  how  little 
attention,  except  in  this  instance,  Christianity  attracted  at 
this  period  in  Rome.  It  has  not  been  mentioned  by  Lucan, 
or  the  elder  Pliny,  though  both  these  writers  have  noticed 
the  manners  of  the  Jews;  nor  by  Seneca,  though  Seneca  is 
full  of  the  tenets  of  the  philosophers ; nor  by  Persius,  though 
Persius  is  a shrewd  observer  of  the  salient  features  of  society 
generally.  Such  is  the  silence  of  the  contemporaries  of  St. 
Paul  and  Nero.  Had  the  Christians  occupied,  even  in  the  next 
generation,  a large  space  in  Roman  eyes,  could  the  painters  of 
manners  such  as  Juvenal  and  Martial,  who  have  dashed  in, 
with  such  glaring  colours,  Jews,  Greeks,  and  Egyptians,  have 
failed  to  fill  their  canvas  with  portraits  and  caricatures  of 
them  ? 1 Half  a century  had  passed  from  the  Neronian  per- 

the  second  or  perhaps  the  third  century.  See  Minucius  Felix,  Ociav.  9. ; Ter- 
tulL  Apol.  3. ; Athenagoras,  4. 

1 Juvenal  alludes  (vii.  257.)  to  the  cause  of  Nero’s  persecution,  and  to  the 
mode  of  punishment.  Comp,  also  L 155.  Martial  notices  the  fortitude  of 
those  who  refused  to  sacrifice  with  the  stake  and  pitched  shirt  before  them 


220 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


sedition  before  we  meet  with  the  first  charges  now  extant 
against  them. 

Such  being  the  grounds  for  questioning  the  accuracy  of  our 
accounts  of  this  matter,  it  has  been  suggested  that  it  was 
Question  as  to  against  the  Jews,  not  the  Christians,  the  devotees 
designated^  ^se  Christs,  not  the  worshippers  of  J esus,  the 
“ Christie8-"  wolves  of  the  Transtiberine,  not  the  lambs  of  the 
Palatine,  that  Kero’s  edict  was  really  directed.  We  have 
seen  how  obnoxious  the  Jews  generally  were  to  the  bigotry 
of  the  Roman  populace : they  were  reproached  with  their 
ferocity,  isolation,  and  spiritual  pride ; the  turbulence  of 
their  fanatical  Christ  seekers  had  already  provoked  both 
prince  and  people.  The  menacing  attitude  they  held  in  their 
own  country  was  a cause  at  this  moment  of  increased  exas- 
peration. It  was  easy  to  imagine  that  the  compatriots  of  the 
men  who  were  levying  war  against  Rome  in  Palestine  had 
kindled  a conflagration  in  the  capital  itselfi  Tiberius  had 
gratified  the  popular  clamour  by  deporting  thousands  of  these 
wretches  to  Sardinia.  Claudius  had  expelled  them  in  a body 
from  Rome.  The  people  now  stimulated  Kero  to  make 
shorter  and  bloodier  work  with  them ; and  the  fanatics  of  the 
city  were  subjected  to  the  same  barbarous  vengeance  which 
had  alighted  repeatedly  on  their  brethren  in  the  mountains  of 
Galilee  and  the  wilderness  of  Judea.  It  is  conjectured  that 
our  authorities,  -writing  fifty  years  later,  confused  the  Jews 
with  the  Christians.  That  Suetonius,  in  a previous  statement, 
had  fallen  into  such  an  error,  is  generally  admitted.  He  may 
have  done  the  same  in  this  place.  Tacitus,  though  a graver 
authority,  is  liable  to  the  charge  of  colouring  the  events  he 
describes  with  the  hues  of  his  own  period.  When  ho  wrote 
the  false  Christs  were  extinguished  and  forgotten,  but  the 
true  Christ  had  become  notorious  throughout  the  empire. 
The  true  believers,  meek  and  inoffensive  as  they  were,  had 
succeeded,  by  an  unjust  fate,  to  all  the  odium  which  had 

(x.  25.).  This  may  refer  to  the  later  persecution  of  Trajan.  There  can  be 
little  doubt  that  this  barbarous  torture  was  invented  before  Nero  (see  Senec. 
Epist.  14.),  and  continued  to  be  practiced  after  him. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


221 


popularly  attached  to  the  fanatics.  On  the  Christians,  re- 
garded as  a remnant  or  revival  of  Judaism,  Tacitus,  it  may 
be  supposed,  bestowed  all  the  bitterness  which  a terrible  war 
had  engendered  in  Roman  breasts  against  everything  Jewish.1 
They  were  lying  at  the  moment  under  sentence  of  proscrip- 
tion by  his  master,  Trajan:  they  were  deserting  the  temples, 
withholding  sacrifice  from  the  imperial  altars,  meeting  in  se- 
cret and  illicit  conclave  in  the  provinces,  and  Pliny,  the  friend 
of  Tacitus,  was  inquiring  how  he  should  proceed  towards 
them.2 3 * * * *  Whatever  the  historian  may  think  of  the  charges  of 
immorality  ealumniously  preferred  against  them,  their  antici- 
pations of  a world-wide  triumph,  of  the  fall  of  the  empire, 
and  the  dissolution  of  the  age  in  fire,  might  be  held  as  dam- 
ning  evidence  against  them,  and  entitle  them  in  his  view  to  a 
return  of  that  scorn  and  hatred  which  they  were  deemed 
themselves  to  cherish  against  the  whole  frame  of  so- 
ciety.8 

Such  is  the  view  recommended  to  us  by  the  great  name 
of  Gibbon,  which  it  is  due  perhaps  to  his  character  as  an  his- 
torian to  lay  before  the  reader.  Though  liable  to  conjecture  of 
the  suspicion  of  interested  motives,  he  is  too  Glbbon- 
shrewd  to  advance  even  an  interested  argument  without 
reasonable  grounds.  But  the  existence  of  Christians  in  the 
time  of  Nero  is  no  longer  held  to  depend  in  any  degree  on 
the  testimony  of  Tacitus,  nor  does  the  conjecture  merit  in 

1 It  should  be  noticed,  to  show  how  readily  Tacitus  might  confound  the 

Jews  and  the  Christians,  that  he  characterizes  both  in  precisely  the  same  re- 
markable terms.  Comp,  of  the  Christians,  Ann.  xv.  44. : “ Odio  generis  hu- 
mani ; ” and  of  the  Jews,  Hist.  v.  5. : “ Adversus  omnes  alios  hostile  odium.” 

3 Plin.  Epist.  x.  96.  (97.) : a letter  supposed  to  have  been  written  in  the 

year  104,  probably  a few  years  earlier  than  the  later  books  of  the  Annals. 

3 These  topics  had  not  been  untouched  by  St.  Paul ; but  it  will  be  readily 

conceived  that  it  was  after  the  fall  of  Jerusalem  and  the  publication  of  the 

Apocalypse  that  they  became  most  prominent,  and  began  to  attract  the  notice 

of  the  heathens.  Dr.  Milman,  feeling  the  difficulty  which  attaches  to  our  ac- 
counts of  the  Neronian  persecution,  has  suggested  that  the  popular  hatred  tow- 
ards the  Christians,  and  belief  in  their  guilt,  were  caused  by  their  vaunts  of 
an  impending  conflagration  of  the  world.  Hist,  of  Christianity , ii.  37. 


222 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


itself  the  disdain,  real  or  affected,  with  which  our  polemics 
have  generally  treated  it.1 

For  myself,  perplexed  by  the  received  account,  yet  scru- 
pling to  admit  such  entire  misapprehension  on  the  part  of  our 
Another  view  authorities,  I crave  a fair  consideration  for  anoth- 
suggested.  er  suggestion  : — that  the  suspicions  of  the  Roman 
mob  were  directed  against  the  turbulent  Jews,  notorious  for 
their  appeals  to  the  name  of  Christ,  as  an  expected  prince  or 
leader : — that  these  fanatics,  arrested  and  questioned,  not  so 
much  of  the  burning  as  of  their  political  creed,  sought  to 
implicate  the  true  disciples,  known  to  them  and  hated  by 
them,  however  obscure  and  inoffensive  in  Roman  eyes,  in  the 
same  charge  :2 — that  the  true  Christians,  thus  associated  in  the 
charge  of  Christ- worship,  avowed  the  fact  in  their  own  sense, 
a sense  which  their  judges  did  not  care  to  discriminate : — that 
the  believers  became  thus  more  or  less  sufferers,  though  dou- 
bly innocent  both  of  the  fire  and  of  political  disaffection : — 
finally,  that  our  historians,  misled  by  this  false  information, 
finding  even  in  the  public  records  that  the  name  of  Christ 
was  the  common  shibboleth  of  the  victims,  too  readily  imag- 
ined that  the  persecution  was  directed  against  the  Chris- 
tians only.  Frightful  as  this  attack  on  the  brethren  was,  it 
thus  fell  only  obliquely  upon  them ; it  may  be  hoped  that  it 
was  as  transient  as  it  was  sudden.  If  we  may  draw  any  con- 
clusions from  the  monuments  lately  discovered  of  the  Clau- 
dian  freedmen,  it  would  seem  that  many  of  the  disciples, 
whom  St.  Paul  had  greeted  by  name,  died  quietly  in  their 
beds.  Though  Christian  writers  have  concurred  in  citing 
the  Neronian  as  the  first  of  their  persecutions,  it  is  remark- 
able that  the  Church  has  specified  none  of  its  victims  among 

1 Gibbon,  DecL  and  Fall , ch.  xvi. 

2 The  animosity  of  the  Jews  of  the  old  faith  to  the  Christian  reformers  is 
strongly  marked  in  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  and  recurs  again  in  almost  the 
earliest  documents  of  the  first  apostolic  age.  See  particularly  Martyr.  Poly- 
carp. c.  13. ; Justin  Martyr,  Dialog,  and  Apol. ; Tertullian,  adv.  Judoeos.  Taci- 
tus himself  points  to  the  betrayal  of  one  set  of  victims  by  another : “ primo 
correpti  qui  fatebantur.  deinde  indido  corum  multitudo  ingens.” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


223 


her  noble  army  of  Martyrs.1  St.  Paul  himself  is  not  suppos- 
ed to  have  fallen  on  this  occasion.  Absent  at  the  time  from 
Rome,  he  returned  there  soon  after ; but  in  the  epistle  he  wrote 
from  thence  within  two  or  three  years  of  this  date,  no  allusion 
occurs  to  the  recent  sufferings  of  his  disciples.  The  story  that 
he  was  beheaded  at  Rome  in  the  last  year  of  Nero  has  been 
current  from  early  times ; but  this  tradition,  however  proba- 
ble in  itself,  is  attended  with  circumstances  which  show 
how  little  it  was  connected,  in  the  minds  of  the  first  Chris- 
tians, with  the  theory  of  a general  proscription  of  their 
faith.2 

The  notion  that  Nero’s  measures  extended  to  the  provinces, 
or  issued  in  a standing  decree  against  Christianity,  though 
attested  by  some  of  the  ancients  and  much  cher- 

n General  relig- 

ished  by  many  moderns,  rests  on  slender  and  ous  toleration 

. , . , T . . under  Nero. 

equivocal  testimony,  it  was  one  thing  to  in- 
dulge the  momentary  rage  of  the  populace,  another  to  estab- 
lish the  principle  of  religious  persecution.  There  seems  no 

1 Mosheim,  De  Rebus  Christ,  ante  Constant,  saec.  i.  § 34. 

2 For  the  presumed  date  of  St.  Paul’s  martyrdom  I refer  to  the  statement 
of  Jerome:  “ xiv.  Neronis  anno,”  Catal.  c.  5.  Cyril  of  Jerusalem  reported 
that  his  death  was  caused  by  a quarrel  with  Simon  Magus,  Chrysostom  that  he 
was  punished  for  having  converted  Nero’s  mistress  ( Cave's  Life  of  St.  Paul). 
That  St.  Paul  suffered  at  Rome  has  been  a constant  tradition  from  early  times 
(Euseb.  Hist  Heel.  ii.  25. ; Origen,  in  Gen.  iii.) ; but  the  argument  from  Clem- 
ens Romanus  (i.  5.,  possibly  the  original  authority  for  it)  seems  to  me  mere 
trifling.  A Regius  professor  of  divinity  ought  not  to  sanction  the  translation 
of  paprvpr/aag  knl  ruv  qyovfi&uv,  martyrium  subiens  sub  prcefeclis  Urbis  ; and 
a learned  chronologer’s  illustration  of  the  phrase  by  the  Svo  dvrotcpdropeg  (He- 
lius  and  Nero)  of  Dion,  is  an  ingenious  extravagance.  Perhaps  a cautious  in- 
quirer will  be  satisfied  with  the  language  of  the  apostle  himself  (2  Tim.  iv. 
6-16.),  which  indicates  the  expectation  of  speedy  martyrdom,  and  may  itself 
have  suggested  the  ecclesiastical  tradition. 

3 That  the  persecution  extended  to  the  provinces  is  first  asserted  by  Oro- 
sius  (vii.  71.).  This  notion  is  considered  to  be  amply  refuted  by  Dodwell 
(Dm.  Cypr.  xi.).  See  Gieseler,  Eccl.  Hist.  L 1.  28.  The  Lusitanian  inscrip- 
tion is  given  up.  That  Nero  issued  a standing  decree  against  Christianity, 
which  continued  to  be  the  law  of  the  empire,  is  roundly  asserted  by  Tertullian 
(ad  Nation,  i.  7.),  a writer  prone  to  misinterpret  facts  to  the  advantage  of  his 
own  argument. 


224 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


reason  to  doubt  that  Nero  respected  the  maxims  of  his  coun- 
try in  tolerating  generally  all  religions  against  which  no 
public  scandal  could  be  alleged.  The  citizens  were  not  re- 
strained by  law  from  practising  foreign  rites,  provided  they 
did  not  overtly  reject  those  of  the  nation,  and  their  conduct, 
even  in  this  particular,  was  not  jealously  watched.  The 
proselytes  to  Judaism,  and  even  to  Christianity,  might  pos- 
sibly evade  the  required  solemnities ; the  magistrates  were 
lax,  the  bystanders  were  indifferent.  As  yet  we  meet  with 
no  indication  of  that  uneasy  apprehension  of  spiritual  emo- 
tions, expressed  by  the  specific  inhibition  of  new  and  strange 
religions  by  ichich  the  minds  of  men  may  be  moved , which 
marked  a later  period  of  Roman  jurisprudence.1  Toleration, 
indeed,  on  such  a basis,  constitutes  no  claim  to  a prudent  lib- 
erality on  the  part  of  the  Roman  government.  It  was  rather 
an  unreflecting  persistence  in  habits  of  thought  derived  from 
another  state  of  society.  The  toleration  of  the  empire  was  a 
relic  of  the  proud  exclusiveness  of  primitive  ages,  which 
never  contemplated  the  possibility  of  the  sons  of  Mars  and 
Rhea  deigning  to  bow  before  the  gods  of  enemies  and  stran- 
gers ; which  had  no  fear  of  innovation,  nor  appreciated  the 
risks  of  conversion.  The  government  indulged  in  indolent 
security  while  the  foundations  of  the  old  ideas  were  crum- 
bling away.  The  active  growth  of  Christianity  first  opened 
the  eyes  of  rulers  and  people.  The  sword  had  been  long  sus- 
pended over  the  Christians ; sometimes  it  had  descended, 
and  the  disciples,  always  insecure,  had  been  made  to  suffer ; 
but  whenever  the  jealousy  of  the  state  was  awakened,  no 
special  edict  was  required  to  drag  them  before  the  altar  of 
Jupiter,  and  invite  them  to  sprinkle  it  with  incense,  and  con- 
ceive a vow  to  the  genius  of  the  emperor.2 

1 Paul.  Sentent.  v.  21.  2.  “ Novae  et  usu  incognitae,  quibus  mentes  homi- 

num  moveantur.” 

2 The  fact  that  Nero’s  was  the  first  persecution,  the  barbarities  attending 
it,  possibly  also  the  notoriety  given  to  it  by  the  narrative  of  Tacitus,  impressed 
later  generations  of  Christians  with  a peculiar  horror  of  this  tyrant.  But  the 
notion  that  he  was  the  Antichrist  of  the  Apocalypse,  and  that  he  should  return 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


225 


The  Roman  Empire,  at  this  epoch,  was  like  one  of  the 
statues  so  common  at  the  time,  in  which  a new  head  had  been 
fitted  to  the  original  trunk  ; and  as  the  sculptor,  ^ govern_ 
passing  his  finger-nail  along  the  marble,  assured  ^ppo?tedby° 
himself  that  the  juncture  was  not  sensible  to  the  nessTnd^rueity 
touch,  so  the  citizens  might  believe,  under  the  of  the  age- 
widespread  liberty  of  thought  they  actually  enjoyed,  that 
the  fatal  severance  between  freedom  and  despotism  was  not 
to  be  detected  by  the  nicest  organs.1  But  beneath  the  more 
refined  and  sensitive  classes  of  the  capital,  those  which  claim- 
ed the  privilege  of  thought  and  knew  how  to  use  it,  lay  next 
the  multitude  of  triflers  and  idlers,  the  rich  voluptuaries,  the 
pampered  officials,  the  upstart  freedmen  of  the  emperor  and 
his  courtiers,  who,  environed  as  they  were  with  perils,  endur- 
ed the  tyranny  of  the  Caesars  for  the  sake  of  their  own  ease 
and  luxury,  and  were  content  to  enjoy  the  present  hour 
without  regard  to  the  past  or  the  future.  Minds  enervated 
by  indulgence,  shattered  by  vice,  estranged  from  all  high 
and  pure  aspirations  by  the  pleasures  of  sense,  were  unable 
to  cope  with  despotism : these  men  could  only  crouch  like 
dogs  under  the  uplifted  arm  of  their  master ; they  had  not 
energy  even  to  fly  from  it.  Whatever  indignation  they  might 
feel  towards  the  tyrant,  they  could  only  vent  it  in  spiteful  dem- 
onstrations against  his  creatures,  and  he  could  at  any  time 
avert  their  murmurs  from  himself  by  throwing  to  them  a 
victim  from  his  own  court  or  household.  Then  was  revealed 
on  the  public  stage  of  history  the  secret  to  which  the  inte- 
rior of  every  private  house  could  testify,  of  the  fearful  union 
which  may  subsist  between  soft  voluptuous  manners  and  cal- 

in  power  from  the  Euphrates  (xiii.  3.,  xvi.  12.,  xvii.  8.  16. ; comp.  Neander, 
Pjlanzung  und  Leitung , p.  480.),  cannot  be  traced  to  primitive  times.  The  date 
of  the  pseudo-Sibylline  oracle,  e\f  avandgipei  ica^ov  deed  avrdv  is  very  uncer- 
tain. St.  Augustine  ( Civ.  Pei.  xx.  19.)  speaks  of  the  belief  as  common,  but 
not  universal,  in  his  day : “ Nonnulli  ipsum  resurrecturum,  et  futurum  Anti- 
Christum  suspicantur.”  Comp.  Lactantius,  de  Mort.  Persecut.  c.  2.,  and  some 
verses  of  Commodianus,  possibly  of  the  third  century. 

1 Pers.  Sat.  i.  64. : “ Ut  per  laeve  severos  Effundat  junctura  ungues.” 

VOL.  VI. — 15 


226 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


lous  ferocity  of  disposition.  Then  the  men  whose  own  mus- 
cles were  flaccid  with  the  abuse  of  the  bath,  the  table,  and 
the  couch,  were  seen  to  gloat  with  horrid  fascination  over  the 
pangs  of  physical  suffering  they  wantonly  inflicted.  The 
cruelty  of  the  women  vied  with  that  of  the  men.  To  these 
cynical  sensualists,  with  a depravity  of  feeling  unfortunately 
not  uncommon,  the  spectacle  of  virtue  tormented  would  be  a 
positive  enjoyment ; and  there  is  too  much  reason  to  appre- 
hend that  by  them  the  despotism  of  a Nero  was  supported 
for  the  gratification  it  ministered  to  their  fiendish  malicious- 
ness. 

The  corrupt  morality  of  the  age,  pervading  all  ranks  and 
classes,  was,  above  all,  the  cause  of  the  patient  endurance  of 
Reflections  on  tyranny  which  so  lamentably  distinguished  it. 
moraiu^of  the  With  the  loss  of  self-respect  engendered  by  mere- 
age*  ly  selfish  indulgences  men  lose  that  keen  sense  of 

wrong  even  when  inflicted  on  themselves,  which  nerves  the 
hand  of  resistance  more  vigorously  than  fear  or  pain.  The 
distrust  which  the  victim  of  Tiberius  and  Nero  conceived  for 
all  around  him,  from  the  consciousness  of  his  own  turpitude, 
paralysed  every  attempt  at  combination.  The  vices  common 
to  all  great  cities  flourished  with  rank  luxuriance  in  the  cap- 
ital of  a society  thus  depraved  and  soulless.  Sensuality  in 
its  most  degrading  forms  pervaded  all  classes,  and  was  fos- 
tered by  the  publicity  of  ordinary  life,  by  the  allurements  of 
art,  sometimes  by  the  direct  injunctions  of  a gross  supersti- 
tion, to  a degree  of  shamelessness  which  has  made  it  the  op- 
probrium of  history.  Doubtless  the  iniquities  of  Rome  have 
been  more  nakedly  exposed  than  those  of  modern  cities  by 
the  unblushing  frankness  of  its  moralists  and  satirists ; but 
their  frankness  or  effrontery  was  itself  a product  of  the  li- 
centiousness of  the  age  : Juvenal  would  have  cast  a veil  over 
the  wantonness  he  chastised,  if  public  decorum  had  seemed 
in  the  least  to  require  it.  The  distinguishing  vices  of  the 
great  were  meanness  and  servility,  the  pursuit  of  money  by 
every  artifice  and  compliance : they  had  little  of  the  sense  of 
honour  which  forms  an  exterior  bulwark  even  to  feeble  moral 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


227 


principles  among  ourselves.  The  poor,  on  the  other  hand, 
with  their  dearest  wants  and  pleasures  provided  for  them, 
were  not  stimulated  to  dishonesty  by  the  dire  struggle  for 
life,  or  even  by  the  thirst  of  advancement,  which  are  at  once 
the  bane  and  the  preserving  salt  of  modern  society.  But 
they  were  brutal,  bloodthirsty,  callous  to  the  infliction  of 
pain,  familiar  in  daily  life  with  cruelties  such  as  we  shudder 
to  hear  of  in  modern  times  under  the  influence  of  violent  pas- 
sions, in  the  momentary  excesses  of  popular  outbreaks.  Much 
candour  and  discrimination  are  required  in  comparing  the 
sins  of  one  age  with  those  of  another,  still  more  in  pronounc- 
ing between  them,  especially  where  the  hideousness  of  the 
subject  must  deter  us  from  dragging  them  fully  into  light : 
but  we  must  not  be  led  to  lay  upon  Pagan  Idolatry  too  large 
a share  of  the  reproach  from  which  even  true  religion  has 
not  been  exempted ; for  Christianity,  divine  as  it  is  in  its  pre- 
cepts and  its  sanctions,  has  proved  but  weak  in  contending 
against  the  passions  of  our  corrupt  nature : the  cruelty  of 
our  Inquisitions  and  sectarian  persecutions,  of  our  laws 
against  sorcery,  our  serfdom  and  our  slavery  ; the  petty  fraud- 
ulence  we  tolerate  in  almost  every  class  and  calling  of  the 
community ; the  bold  front  worn  by  our  open  sensuality ; the 
deeper  degradation  of  that  which  is  concealed;  all  these 
leave  us  little  room  for  boasting  of  our  modern  discipline, 
and  must  deter  the  thoughtful  inquirer  from  too  confidently 
contrasting  the  morals  of  the  old  world  and  the  new. 

The  fairest,  perhaps,  and  certainly  the  most  pleasing  com- 
parison we  can  make  between  modern  and  ancient  civiliza- 
tion, between  the  effect  of  a divine  and  a human 

, . t • i • Counteracting 

teaching,  lies  m the  virtues  they  may  seem  re-  principles  of 
spectively  to  have  fostered : for  we  must  not  for- 
get that  even  under  heathenism  there  was  always  a moral 
teaching  at  work,  and  amidst  all  the  incentives  to  vice,  in- 
struction was  never  wanting  in  virtue.  However  feebly  the 
voice  of  religion  or  philosophy  may  have  fallen  on  the  ears 
of  the  multitude,  the  circumstances  of  daily  life  read  constant 
lessons  in  love  and  honesty.  Human  nature  indeed,  like  run- 


228 


HISTORY  OF  THE  R01IAYS 


ning  water,  has  a tendency  to  pnrify  itself  by  action ; the 
daily  wants  of  life  call  forth  corresponding  duties,  and  duties 
daily  performed  settle  into  principles,  and  ripen  into  graces. 
Even  at  Rome  in  the  worst  of  times,  men  of  affairs,  particu- 
larly those  in  middle  stations,  most  removed  from  the  tempta- 
tions of  luxury  and  poverty,  were  in  the  habitual  practice 
of  integrity  and  self-denial ; mankind  had  faith  in  the  general 
honesty  of  their  equals,  in  the  justice  of  their  patrons,  in  the 
fidelity  of  their  dependents : husbands  and  wives,  parents  and 
children,  exercised  the  natural  affections,  and  relied  on  their 
being  reciprocated : all  the  relations  of  life  were  adorned  in 
turn  with  bright  instances  of  devotion,  and  mankind  trans- 
acted their  business  with  an  ordinary  confidence  in  the  force 
of  conscience  and  right  reason.  The  steady  development  of 
enlightened  legal  principles  conclusively  proves  the  general 
dependence  upon  law  as  a guide  and  corrector  of  manners. 
In  the  camp  however,  more  especially,  as  the  chief  sphere  of 
this  purifying  activity,  the  great  qualities  of  the  Roman 
character  continued  to  be  plainly  manifested.  The  history 
of  the  Caesars  presents  to  us  a constant  succession  of  brave, 
patient,  resolute,  and  faithful  soldiers,  men  deeply  impressed 
with  a sense  of  duty,  superior  to  vanity,  despisers  of  boast- 
ing, content  to  toil  in  obscurity  and  shed  their  blood  at  the 
frontiers  of  the  empire,  unrepining  at  the  cold  mistrust  of 
their  masters,  not  clamorous  for  the  honours  so  sparingly 
awarded  them,  but  satisfied  in  the  daily  work  of  their  hands, 
and  full  of  faith  in  the  national  destiny  which  they  were  daily 
accomplishing.  If  such  humble  instruments  of  society  around 
them  are  not  to  be  compared  for  the  importance  of  their  mis 
sion  with  the  votaries  of  speculative  wisdom,  who  protested 
in  their  lives  and  in  their  deaths  against  the  crimes  of  their 
generation,  there  is  still  something  touching  in  the  simple 
heroism  of  these  chiefs  of  the  legions,  of  which  we  have  met 
already  with  some  bright  examples,  and  shall  encounter  many 
more, — the  heroism  of  a Plautius,  a Suetonius,  a Yespasian, 
a Corbulo,  and  an  Agricola, — which  preserves  to  us  in  un- 
broken succession  the  features  of  the  Scipios,  the  Catos,  the 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


229 


iEmilii,  and  the  Marcelli.  Here  are  virtues,  not  to  be  named 
indeed  with  the  zeal  of  missionaries  and  the  devotion  of  mar- 
tyrs, hut  worthy  nevertheless  of  a high  place  in  the  esteem 
of  all  who  reverence  human  nature,  which  may  prove,  in  the 
teeth  of  some  thoughtless  fanatics,  that  the  age  was  not  ut- 
terly degraded  which  furnished  the  first  votaries  to  the  Gos- 
pel.1 

The  acceptance  of  Christianity  we  should  consider  not  so 
much  a strong  reaction  from  the  prevailing  wickedness  of  the 
age,  as  a symptom  of  the  aspirations  struggling  Christianity. 
beneath  its  surface,  and  of  its  anxious  demand  congenial  to 

. . . certain  moral 

for  moral  convictions.  I have  shown  m another  tendencies  of 
place  that  the  Gospel  was  not  embraced,  on  its 
first  promulgation  in  Judea,  by  the  despair  of  the  most 
wretched  outcasts  of  humanity,  but  rather  by  the  hopeful  en- 
thusiasm which  urges  those  who  enjoy  a portion  of  the  goods 
of  life  to  improve  and  fortify  their  possession.  And  so  again 
at  Rome  we  have  no  reason  to  suppose  that  Christianity  was 
only  the  refuge  of  the  afflicted  and  miserable ; rather,  if  we 
may  lay  any  stress  upon  the  monuments  above  referred  to, 
it  was  first  embraced  by  persons  in  a certain  grade  of  com- 
fort and  respectability ; by  persons  approaching  to  what  we 
should  call  the  middle  classes  in  their  condition,  their  educa- 
tion and  their  moral  views.  Of  this  class  Seneca  himself  was 
the  idol,  the  oracle : he  was,  so  to  say,  the  favourite  preacher 
of  the  more  intelligent  and  humane  disciples  of  nature  and 
virtue.  Now  the  writings  of  Seneca  show,  in  their  way,  a 
real  anxiety  among  this  class  to  raise  the  moral  tone  of  man- 
kind around  them : a spirit  of  reform,  a zeal  for  the  conver- 


1 These  remarks,  I know,  are  liable  to  misconstruction,  but  it  seems  a duty 
to  protest  against  the  common  tendency  of  Christian  moralists  to  dwell  only  on 
the  dark  side  of  Pagan  society,  in  order  to  heighten  by  contrast  the  blessings 
of  the  Gospel.  The  argument  becomes  dangerous  when  the  treatment  of  it  is 
unfair.  The  pretensions  advanced  by  such  an  advocate  as  Count  Champagny 
for  the  Roman  Church,  which  alone  he  identifies  with  Christianity,  to  be  the 
sole  depository  of  all  moral  principles  and  practice,  are  distressing  to  those  who 
reflect  how  fearfully  they  have  been  belied  by  the  result. 


230 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


sion  of  souls,  which,  though  it  never  rose  indeed,  under  the 
teaching  of  the  philosophers,  to  boiling  heat,  still  simmered 
with  genial  warmth  on  the  surface  of  society.  Far  different 
as  was  their  social  standing  point,  far  different  as  were  the 
foundations  and  the  presumed  sanctions  of  their  teaching  re- 
spectively, Seneca  and  St.  Paul  were  both  moral  reformers ; 
both,  be  it  said  with  reverence,  were  fellow-workers  in  the 
cause  of  humanity,  though  the  Christian  could  look  beyond  the 
proximate  aims  of  morality,  and  prepare  men  for  a final  de- 
velopment on  which  the  Stoic  could  not  venture  to  gaze. 
Hence  there  is  so  much  in  their  principles,  so  much  even  in 
their  language,  which  agrees  together,  so  that  the  one  has 
been  thought,  though  it  must  be  allowed  without  adequate 
reason,  to  have  borrowed  directly  from  the  other.1  But  the 
philosopher,  be  it  remembered,  discoursed  to  a large  and  not 
inattentive  audience,  and  surely  the  soil  was  not  all  unfruit- 
ful on  which  his  seed  was  scattered,  when  he  proclaimed  that 
God  dwells  not  in  temples  of  wood  or  stone , nor  wants 
the  ministrations  of  human  hands : 2 that  He  has  no  de- 
light in  the  blood  of  victims : 3 that  He  is  near  to  all  his 
creatures : 4 * that  His  spirit  resides  in  men’s  hearts : 6 that  all 
men  are  truly  His  offspring : 6 that  we  are  members  of  one 
body , which  is  God  or  nature : 7 that  men  must  believe  in 
God  before  they  can  approach  Him : 8 that  the  true  service 
of  God  is  to  be  like  unto  Him : 9 that  all  men  have  sinned , 

1 It  is  hardly  necessary  to  refer  to  the  pretended  letters  between  St.  Paul 
and  Seneca.  Besides  the  evidence  from  style,  some  of  the  dates  they  contain 
are  quite  sufficient  to  condemn  them  as  clumsy  forgeries.  They  are  mentioned, 
but  with  no  expression  of  belief  in  their  genuineness,  by  Jerome  and  Augus- 
tine. See  Jones,  On  the  Canon , ii.  80. 

2 Senec.  Ep.  95.,  and  in  Lactantius,  Inst.  vi. 

8 Ep.  116. : “ Colitur  Deus  non  tauris  sed  pia  et  recta  voluntate.” 

4 Ep.  41.  Id. 

6  Ep.  46. : “ Sacer  intra  nos  spiritus  sedet.” 

6 De  Provid.  i. 

7 Ep.  93.  95. : “ Membra  sumus  magni  corporis.” 

8 Ep.  95. : “ Primus  Deorum  cultus  est  Deos  credere.” 

9 Ep.  95. : “ Satis  coluit  quisquis  imitatus  est.” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


231 


and  none  performed  all  the  works  of  the  law  : 1 2 that  God  is 
no  respecter  of  nations , ranks , or  conditions , but  all , barba- 
rian and  Roman , bond  and  free , are  alike  under  Sis  all-see- 
ing Providence .a 

St.  Paul  enjoined  submission  and  obedience  even  to  the 
tyranny  of  Hero,  and  Seneca  fosters  no  ideas  subversive  of 
political  subjection.  Endurance  is  the  para- 

• _ _ Seneca  s politi- 

mount  virtue  of  the  Stoic.  To  forms  of  govern-  cai  and  moral 

ment  the  wise  man  was  wholly  indifferent ; they 

were  among:  the  external  circumstances  above  which  his 


spirit  soared  in  serene  self-contemplation.  We  trace  in 
Seneca  no  yearning  for  a resortation  of  political  freedom,  nor 
does  he  even  point  to  the  senate,  after  the  manner  of  the 
patriots  of  the  day,  as  a legitimate  check  to  the  autocracy  of 
the  despot.  The  only  mode,  in  his  view,  of  tempering  tyr- 
anny is  to  educate  the  tyrant  himself  in  virtue.  His  was  the 
self-denial  of  the  Christians,  but  without  their  anticipated 
compensation.  It  seems  impossible  to  doubt  that  in  his 
highest  flights  of  rhetoric, — and  no  man  ever  recommended 
the  unattainable  with  a finer  grace, — Seneca  must  have  felt 
that  he  was  labouring  to  build  up  a house  without  founda- 
tions ; that  his  system,  as  Caius  said  of  his  style,  was  sand 
without  lime.  He  was  surely  not  unconscious  of  the  incon- 
sistency of  his  own  position,  as  a public  man  and  a minister, 
with  the  theories  to  which  he  had  wedded  himself ; and  of 
the  impossibility  of  preserving  in  it  the  purity  inconsiste?cy 
of  his  character  as  a philosopher  or  a man.  He  and 

was  aware  that  in  the  existing  state  of  society  at  Ms  con(iuct- 
Rome,  wealth  was  necessary  to  men  high  in  station : wealth 


1 Senec.  de  Ira , i.  14. ; ii.  27. : “ Quis  est  iste  qui  se  profitetur  omnibus  le- 
gibus  innocentem  ? ” 

2 De  Benef.  iii.  18. : “ Virtus  omnes  admittit  libertinos,  servos,  reges.” 
These  and  many  other  passages  are  collected  by  Champagny,  ii.  546.,  after  Fa- 
bricius  and  others,  and  compared  with  well-known  texts  in  Scripture.  The  ver- 
sion of  the  Vulgate  shows  a great  deal  of  verbal  correspondence.  M.  Trop- 
long  remarks,  after  De  Maistre,  that  Seneca  has  written  a fine  book  on  Provi- 
dence, for  which  there  was  not  even  a name  at  Rome  in  the  time  of  Cicero. 
V Influence  du  Christianisme,  &c.,  i.  ch.  4. 


232 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


alone  could  retain  influence,  and  a poor  minister  became  at 
once  contemptible.  The  distributor  of  the  imperial  favours 
must  have  his  banquets,  his  receptions,  his  slaves  and  freed- 
men ; he  must  possess  the  means  of  attracting  if  not  of  brib- 
ing ; he  must  not  seem  too  virtuous,  too  austere,  among  an 
evil  generation ; in  order  to  do  good  at  all  he  must  swim 
with  the  stream,  however  polluted  it  might  be.  All  this  in- 
consistency Seneca  must  have  contemplated  without  blench- 
ing ; and  there  is  something  touching  in  the  serenity  he  pre- 
served amidst  the  conflict  that  must  have  perpetually  raged 
between  his  natural  sense  and  his  acquired  principles.  Both 
Cicero  and  Seneca  were  men  of  many  weaknesses,  and  we  re- 
mark them  the  more  because  both  were  pretenders  to  unusual 
strength  of  character : but  while  Cicero  lapsed  into  political 
errors,  Seneca  cannot  be  absolved  of  actual  crime.  Never- 
theless, if  we  may  compare  the  greatest  masters  of  Roman  wis- 
dom together,  the  Stoic  will  appear,  I think,  the  more  earnest 
of  the  two,  the  more  anxious  to  do  his  duty  for  its  own  sake, 
the  more  sensible  of  the  claims  of  mankind  upon  him  for  such 
precepts  of  virtuous  living  as  he  had  to  give.  In  an  age  of 
unbelief  and  compromise,  he  taught  that  Truth  was  positive 
and  Virtue  objective.  He  conceived,  what  never  entered 
Cicero’s  mind,  the  idea  of  improving  his  fellow-creatures : he 
had,  what  Cicero  had  not,  a heart  for  conversion  to  Christian- 
ity* 

The  advance  of  moral  principles  between  the  age  of  Cicero 
and  Seneca  is  strongly  marked  by  the  favour  with  which  the 
expression  has  been  received  that  the  Stoic  was 

Aulus  Persius  a A . ~ . 

teacher  of  enveloped , as  it  were , in  the  atmosphere  of  Chris- 

tianity.1 We  possess  one  other  small  volume  of 
the  moral  teaching  of  the  time,  comprising  the  six  satires  of 

1 Troplong,  L c.,  who  cannot  altogether  give  up  the  significancy  of  the 
phrase,  “ Seneca  noster,”  so  common  with  the  fathers  of  the  church.  See  St. 
Jerome,  de  Script.  Eccl.  c.  12. ; Tertull.  de  Anim.  1. ; August,  de  Civ.  Pei,  vi. 
10.  He  adds : “ Sa  correspondance  avec  S.  Paul,  quoique  apocryphe,  ne  vaut- 
elle  pas  d’ailleurs  comme  mythe  ? ” I have  already  mentioned  the  coincidence 
of  the  use  of  “ caro  ” in  Seneca  and  St.  Paul.  Troplong  says  that  “ angelus  ” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


233 


the  poet  Persius,  himself  also  a Stoic,  and  a pupil  of  the  Stoic 
Cornutus,  the  friend  and  probably  the  freedman  of  the  family 
of  Seneca.  Aulus  Persius  was  born  in  the  year  787,  and  died 
in  the  middle  of  Nero’s  reign,  at  the  early  age  of  twenty- 
eight.  Possessed  of  ample  means,  and  with  weakly  health, 
he  engaged  in  no  public  affairs,  but  devoted  himself  entirely 
to  philosophical  speculation,  to  which  he  did  honour  by  the 
purity  and  simplicity  of  his  private  life.  The  fastidiousness, 
perhaps,  rather  than  the  ardour  of  his  virtue  urged  him  to 
step  forth  as  a moral  reformer:  the  passion  of  his  contem- 
poraries for  verse  composition  suggested  to  him  the  vehicle 
of  poetical  satire  rather  than  of  prose  dissertation ; and  his 
lucubrations,  curious  and  not  uninstructive  as  they  are,  have 
doubtless  been  preserved  to  us  only  by  the  accident  of  the 
form  in  which  they  have  been  conveyed.  Of  the  poetical 
merit  of  these  singular  compositions  I have  no  occasion  here 
to  speak:  they  have  been  variously  judged;  but  those  who 
have  criticized  most  severely  their  jejuneness  in  thought  and 
general  crabbedness  of  expression,  have  done  scant  justice  to 
the  smartness  of  observation  and  felicity  of  language  with 
which  they  occasionally  glitter.1  In  a moral  point  of  view, 
however,  they  are  not  without  their  significance.  A com- 
parison of  the  satires  of  Persius  with  those  of  Horace  may 
serve  to  mark  the  progress  of  the  age  in  ethical  principles. 
Horace  shoots  folly  as  it  flies : his  bolts  are  either  flung  at 
random  for  his  own  amusement,  or,  as  I have  elsewhere  sug- 
gested, have  a covert  political  object : there  is  neither  love 
of  truth,  nor  indignation  at  vice,  nor  scorn  of  baseness,  nor  a 

occurs  also  in  its  biblical  sense  in  the  writings  of  the  philosopher.  But  the 
great  subject  of  the  presumed  influence  of  Christianity  on  the  moral  teaching 
of  this  and  later  periods  may  be  conveniently  reserved  for  another  occasion. 
M.  Denis,  in  his  recent  work,  Idees  Morales  dans  V Antiquite,  has  traced  some 
Christian  maxims  far  back  into  the  region  of  heathen  philosophy. 

1 M.  Nisard’s  judgment  on  Persius  is  harsh  and  unfair  {Etudes  sur  les  Poetes 
Lot.  de  la  Decadence , i.  201.)  The  passages  from  Boileau  which  he  cites  in 
comparison  are  sufficient  to  demonstrate  the  superiority  of  the  third  in  rank 
of  the  Roman  satirists  over  the  first  of  the  moderns. 


234 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


generous  wish  to  amend  error.  But  Persius  is  not  a man  of 
the  world  amusing  himself  with  his  fellow-creatures ; he  is  a 
philosopher  seeking  to  understand  them,  and  still  further,  he 
is  a philosopher  of  the  age  and  school  of  Seneca,  really  anxious 
to  instruct  them.  He  recalls  men  to  true  wisdom  by  showing 
not  the  sin  or  folly,  or  the  evil  consequences  of  their  passions, 
but  their  inconsistency.  Men  and  women,  he  lets  us  know, 
are  not  true  philosophers : they  say  one  thing  and  do  another, 
in  youth  and  age,  in  public  and  private  life,  in  the  street  and 
in  the  chamber,  with  no  intention  to  deceive,  but  from  defec- 
tive education.1  Genuine  philosophy  alone  can  teach  them 
to  choose  the  right  path  and  to  keep  it : this  is  the  training 
which  makes  men  true  to  themselves  and  to  society.  This  is 
a wisdom  which  it  is  in  the  power  of  every  man  to  attain : 
and  this  wisdom  he  shows  us  by  his  own  example  is  JYot 
harsh  and  crabbed  as  dull  fools  suppose , but  musical  as  is 
Apollo's  lute.  The  philosophy  of  the  Porch  was  never  so 
persuasively  recommended  as  by  the  charming  verses  in 
which  Persius  sings  of  the  influence  Cornutus  exercised  on 
his  youthful  affections,  and  the  perfect  harmony  which  sub- 
sisted in  heart  and  soul  between  the  master  and  the  pupil, 
into  whose  purged  ear  he  had  instilled  the  fruitful  seed  of 
Cleanthes.2 

It  has  been  supposed  that,  in  his  strictures  on  the  bad 
taste  of  contemporary  versifiers,  Persius  has  covertly  reflect- 

1 Thus,  the  temple-worshipper  is  inconsistent  when  he  thinks  he  can  seduce 
the  pure  and  holy  gods  (ii.  4.) : the  tyrant,  who  thinks  himself  powerful  but  is 
really  the  slave  of  his  terrors  (iii.  42.) : the  sick  man  who  resents  his  phy- 
sician’s advice  (iii.  88.).  Every  man  pretends  to  be  different  from  what  he 
really  is  (iv.  23.).  Men  acknowledge  the  necessity  of  wisdom,  but  put  off  seek- 
ing it  (v.  66.).  They  seek  for  liberty  and  fancy  they  have  gained  it,  when  they 
are  really  slaves  to  vice  and  passion  (v.  125.). 

2 Persius,  Sat.  v.  45. : 

“ Non  equidem  hoc  du bites  amborum  foedere  certo 

Consentire  dies,  et  ab  uno  sidere  nasci 

Cultor  enim  juvenum  purgatas  inseris  aures 
Fruge  Cleanthea.  Petite  hinc,  juvenesque  senesque, 

Finem  animo  certum,  miserisque  viatica  cards.” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


235 


ed  on  tlie  effeminacy  of  Zero’s  own  composi-  Nopoiiticai 
tions.1  Be  this  as  it  may,  it  should  be  remem-  the^Skigs^f 
bered  that  the  poet  was  dead  before  the  prince  Persius* 
had  made  himself  generally  infamous  for  worse  faults  than 
those  of  style  and  sentiment.  Nevertheless,  it  is  deserving 
of  remark  that  the  sage,  the  moralist,  the  reformer,  has  not 
uttered  a single  word  on  the  political  aspect  of  the  times ; no 
breath  of  indignation  at  the  servile  submission  of  his  country- 
men, of  consolation  for  broken-hearted  patriots,  of  encour- 
agement for  the  few  gallant  spirits  who  still  might  hope  for 
better  days  to  come.  Persius  betrays  no  consciousness  of 
the  degradation  of  his  countrymen,  nor  yearning  for  the  re- 
covery of  their  ancient  liberties.  A single  allusion  to  the 
freedom  of  the  Athenians  of  old  suggests  only  the  recollec- 
tion of  the  deceptions  practised  upon  them  by  their  dema- 
gogues : a to  the  Senate,  once  the  real  bulwark  of  Roman  in- 
dependence, still  something  more  than  the  mere  shadow  of  a 
great  name,  he  makes  no  allusion  whatever.  The  philoso- 
pher, like  the  Christian,  is  content  that  men  should  work  out 
the  appointed  end  of  their  being  under  the  circumstances  in 
which  Providence  has  placed  them. 

A more  important  contribution  to  the  history  of  mind  and 
opinion  at  this  period,  is  supplied  by  the  Pharsalia  of  Lucan, 
a work  doubly  interesting,  both  from  its  own  ^ « Pharsa. 
peculiar  merits  as  a poem,  and  from  the  fate  of  lia”  of  Lucan* 
its  distinguished  author.  Lucan,  as  we  have  seen,  was  the 
chosen  companion  of  Nero’s  early  days,  being  of  about  the 
same  age,  and  showing  much  of  the  ready  and  brilliant  talent 
which  might  charm  a youth  of  Nero’s  temper  and  accomplish- 
ments. The  stories  that  are  told  of  their  rivalry 

. . . . J Tradition  of  the 

m poetical  exercitations ; ot  the  success  of  the  relations  be- 
subject  and  the  jealousy  of  the  prince;  of  the  and  Nero  ac- 
taunts  with  which  the  one  resented  this  jealousy,  ° 
and  the  other’s  revenge  by  forbidding  him  to  recite  in  public ; 

1 Pers.  Sat  i.  99.  foil.  2 Persius,  Sat  iv.  20. : 

“ Dinomaches  ego  sum,  suffla ; stun  candidus : esto : 

Dum  ne  deterius  sapiat  paunucea  Baucis.” 


236 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


finally,  of  the  stifled  wrath  which  led  the  offended  bard  to 
conspire  against  the  tyrant’s  life ; — all  these  may  in  the 
main  be  true,  though  possibly  coloured  and  exaggerated. 
For  my  own  part,  I am  disposed  to  believe  that  they  grew 
out  of  an  attempt  to  account  for  the  change  of  sentiment, — 
as  it  appears  at  least  to  an  ordinary  observer, — between  the 
commencement  and  the  continuation  of  Lucan’s  poem.  TTe 
have  remarked  already  the  vehement  strain  of  panegyric 
upon  Nero  which  ushers  in  the  great  Epic  of  the  Civil  TCars : 
and  when  we  consider  that  the  author  perished  at  the  age  of 
twenty-six,  in  the  eleventh  year  of  Nero’s  reign,  we  can 
hardly  throw  back  the  period  of  this  dedication  to  the  gold- 
en era  of  the  Quinquennium.  It  must  be  allowed  that  the 
tyrant  had  already  revealed  much  of  the  evil  of  his  charac- 
ter when  the  courtier  dared  to  canonize  his  virtues ; if  the 
stern  republicanism  of  the  poem  as  it  advances  was  an  after- 
thought, it  cannot  be  excused  on  the  common  plea,  that  the 
vices  of  tyranny  were  undiscovered  at  its  commencement. 
Lucan  not  in-  But  after  all,  this  presumed  change  is  a gratuitous 
Msflatteiyof  imputation.  To  Nero  himself,  after  the  opening 
Nero.  invocation,  there  is  no  farther  allusion  ; and  if,  as 

the  current  of  his  verse  rolls  on,  his  appeals  to  the  spirit  of 
liberty  and  denunciations  of  tyranny  become  more  vehement 
and  frequent,  we  must  not  suppose  that  Lucan  regarded  the 
principate  as  a tyranny,  or,  till  the  last  moment  of  personal 
pique  or  indignation,  the  prince  himself  as  a tyrant.1  It 
would  be  a still  greater  mistake  to  represent  the  panegyric 
on  Nero  as  covert  irony.  Lucan  was  perfectly  in  earnest. 
The  poem,  as  we  know,  was  left  unfinished  at  his  death,  and 
though  the  books  may  have  been  successively  recited  to 
friends,  it  was  not,  as  far  as  we  can  judge,  definitively  pub- 

1 Throughout  the  PharsaKa  there  is  no  stronger  expression  of  republican 
indignation  than  in  lines  which  occur  towards  the  end  of  the  first  book : 

“ Superos  quid  prodest  poscere  finem  ? 

Cum  domino  pax  ista  venit : due,  Roma,  malorum 
Continuam  seriem,  clademque  in  tempora  multa 
Extrahe,  civili  tantum  jam  libera  bello.” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


237 


lishedinthe  author’s  lifetime.1  Whatever  his  cause  of  quar- 
rel might  he,  I suppose  that  Lucan,  had  he  deliberately  chang- 
ed his  opinion  on  the  necessity  of  a chief  ruler,  might  have 
taken  measures  for  expunging  the  passage  in  which  it  is  so 
emphatically  asserted. 

But  we  must  not  deceive  ourselves.  Lucan  was  a vehe- 
ment patriot.  He  was  an  ardent  admirer  of  the  historic  lib- 
erties of  his  country.  He  sighed  from  wounded  Lucau  a parti. 
pride  and  offended  virtue,  at  the  remembrance  of  ate,  noX  the 
the  latter  days  of  the  republic,  and  believed  that  PeoPle* 
Rome  had  forfeited  her  appointed  privilege  of  universal  con- 
quest since  she  surrendered  the  pledges  of  her  freedom.2  But 
what  was  the  freedom  he  so  fiercely  regretted  ? It  was  the 
rule  of  his  own  class,  the  licence  to  enjoy  the  fruits  of  con- 
quest claimed,  seized,  and  jealously  guarded  by  the  nobles  and 
senate  in  defiance  of  the  rights  of  every  other  class  of  citi- 
zens, of  the  subject  provincials,  and  of  the  world  at  large. 
Critics  have  asked,  who  is  the  hero  of  the  Pharsalia  ? Is  it 
Caesar,  or  Pompeius,  or  Cato  ? It  is  none  of  the  three,  it  may 
be  answered ; it  is  the  Senate.  Liberty  and  the  Senate  are 
for  ever  in  the  poet’s  mouth,  as  correlative  terms ; but  he  has 
no  yearnings  for  the  people : of  the  knights  as  an  order  in 
the  state  he  never  once  speaks.3  The  Senate  is  his  idol,  its 
temple  is  the  Curia,  and  its  priests  are  the  consuls : but  he 
has  no  incense  for  tribunes  and  chiefs  of  the  Comitia  and  the 

1 Collections  of  small  poems  such  as  odes,  epigrams,  and  satires,  were  pub- 
lished in  separate  books ; but  we  know  of  the  upheld,  and  we  may  infer  the 
same  of  other  works  of  similar  pretensions,  that  portions  were  first  recited  to 
select  audiences,  but  the  poem  reserved  for  publication  as  a whole.  The  same 
appears  to  have  been  the  case  with  the  Metamorphoses.  The  story  that  the 
first  three  books  of  the  Pharsalia  were  corrected  and  published  by  the  writer 
comes  from  an  old  commentary  of  no  authority.  They  are  in  no  respect  more 
correct  than  the  later  books. 

2 Lucan,  Phars.  vii.  426. : 

“ Sed  retro  tua  fata  tulit,  par  omnibus  annis, 

Emathiee  funesta  dies : hac  luce  cruenta 
Effectum,  ut  Latios  non  horreat  India  fasces  ; ” &c. 

8 The  complacency  with  which  the  Senate  is  assumed  to  be  the  governing 


238 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


Forum.  The  idea  he  had  conceived  of  the  policy  of  the  Re- 
public was  a dignified  oligarchy  of  patrician  nobles,  born  to 
sway  the  voters  of  the  Campus  from  the  steps  of  the  temple 
of  Bellona,  to  stride  without  partners  or  rivals  over  every 
province  of  the  empire  they  had  acquired  by  the  blood  of 
their  plebeian  clients.  The  descendants  of  the  fallen  oligar- 
chy, in  the  ardour  of  their  pretended  patriotism,  had  com- 
pletely forgotten  the  tribes  as  an  element  of  their  ancient 
constitution,  and  in  their  aspirations  for  the  revival  of  liberty 
never  dreamed  of  restoring  to  them  any  portion  of  their 
power.  In  the  emperor’s  principate  or  first  place  in  the  sen- 
ate they  fully  acquiesced ; they  did  not  grudge  him  his  seat 
of  honour  between  the  consuls ; it  was  of  his  tribunate,  his 
championship  of  the  people,  that  they  were  alone  really  jeal- 
ous. The  idea  they  entertained  of  a glorious  revolution  was 
He  had  no  wish  n°t  abolition  of  the  empire;  they  desired 
Si$?eiSoniyeto  only  to  eliminate  from  it  the  popular  element, 
empero?toeth^e  an<^  restrict  it  solely  to  a government  through 
senate.  the  senate.  They  would  have  suffered  their  chief 

to  command  their  armies,  as  long  as  he  held  his  command  by 
decree  of  the  senate,  not  by  a law  of  the  people.  They 
would  have  felt  it  as  no  encroachment  on  their  special  rights 
that  he  should  sway  half  the  provinces  as  imperator  or  pro- 
consul.  Such  of  the  emperors  as  had  sought  to  gain  the  fa- 
vour of  the  aristocracy  had  sedulously  humoured  these  selfish 
views.  Nero,  following  the  precepts  of  Augustus  and  the 
example  of  Claudius,  had  sunk  the  tribune  in  the  princeps, 
and  accordingly  Nero  was  long  popular  with  the  senators.  It 
was  not  till  he  began  in  his  caprice  to  make  war  upon  them 

order  of  the  state  is  very  instructive.  See  particularly  the  opening  of  the  fifth 
book  of  the  Pharsalia : 

“ Docuit  populos  venerabilis  Ordo 

Non  Magni  partes,  sed  Magnum  in  partibus  esse 

Cunctaque  jussuri  primum  hoc  decemite  Patres 

Consulite  in  medium,  Patres,  Magnumque  jubete 
Esse  ducem ” 

With  equal  complacency  the  people  are  left  to  Caesar,  v.  382.  392.,  &c. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


239 


personally  that  he  became  personally  hateful  to  them ; but 
even  then  his  government,  still  administered  to  a great  ex- 
tent by  their  order,  retained  its  hold  on  their  consideration, 
and  the  fiercest  patriots  among  them  never  contemplated  its 
overthrow.  They  might  hope  to  remove  Nero  from  its  head, 
and  to  replace  him  by  a puppet  of  their  own ; but  even  Lu- 
can himself,  the  disciple  of  Cato,  when  he  girded  himself  like 
Brutus  with  a dagger  to  take  Caesar’s  life,  had  no  thought  of 
restoring  the  republic  of  free  elections  and  popular  magistra- 
cies. We  shall  find,  as  we  proceed  in  this  history,  that  Taci- 
tus himself,  a patriot  of  calmer  judgment,  was  abundantly 
satisfied  when  he  found  the  senate  placed  ostensibly  at  the 
head  of  affairs,  and  the  emperors  affecting  to  be  no  more 
than  its  hand  and  its  mouth-piece.  Under  Nerva  and  Trajan 
the  Roman  liberals  believed  that  they  had  recovered  the  days 
of  Catulus  and  Pompeius. 

But  to  Lucan,  after  all,  whatever  it  might  be  to  men  of 
more  reflection  and  experience,  the  idea  of  the  senate  was  a 
mere  phantom,  an  abstraction  of  the  imagination,  characteristics 
Our  poet  was  a youth,  bred  a declaimer  of  the  his^ontempo- 
schools,  the  child  and  pupil  of  declaimers  and  raries- 
rhetoricians,  and  his  mind  had  never  been  opened  either  by 
training  or  observation  to  views  of  actual  life.  It  had  be- 
come irksome  to  men  of  age  and  experience  to  mingle  in  pub- 
lic affairs  which  they  were  not  suffered  to  conduct,  and  the 
young  competitors  for  civil  distinction  were  left  without  con- 
trol to  indulge  the  ardour  of  speculative  opinion.  There  was 
no  moral  check  on  their  thoughts,  none  on  their  speech  : the 
new  impulse  given  to  popular  composition  by  the  advent  of 
Nero  to  power  raised  a race  of  schoolboys  to  illegitimate  au- 
thority in  the  world  of  letters.  Young  Rome  of  the  time 
of  Nero  was  eminently  conceited,  and  I fear  eminently  shal- 
low. Placing  Seneca  at  their  head,  as  is  the  wont  of  the 
rising  generation  to  shelter  under  a great  name  its  own  con- 
scious self-distrust,  the  favourites  of  the  prince,  accepted  at 
the  same  time  as  the  favourites  of  the  multitude,  overbore  the 
finest  taste  and  judgment  of  the  veterans  of  literature.  The 


240 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


faults  and  vices  of  youth  were  admired,  humoured,  and  stim- 
ulated. Reserve  and  modesty,  persevering  toil,  patient  self- 
examination,  were  regarded  as  irksome  in  themselves,  and  as 
a reflection  on  the  character  of  the  prince.  Talent  flourish- 
ed in  such  an  atmosphere,  as  in  a forcing-house,  hut  it  was  no 
climate  for  the  natural  ripening  of  genius,  The  wit  and 
cleverness  of  Lucan,  considering  his  years,  are  preternatural : 
the  trumpet-tones  of  his  scorn  or  admiration,  after  more  than 
thirty  years’  familiarity,  still  thunder  in  my  ears  with  start- 
ling intensity  : but  he  has  no  divination  of  men  and  things ; 
his  imagination  never  clothes  itself  in  the  costume  of  the 
past ; he  is  never  transported  out  of  himself ; he  never  saio 
the  conqueror  of  the  Gauls;  he  never  trod  the  plains  of 
Emathia.  If  he  is  to  be  compared  at  all  with  the  inspired 
singer  of  the  HCneid,  pensive,  passionate,  and  abstracted,  I 
know  not  what  more  to  his  advantage  can  be  said,  than  the 
remark  of  Statius,  that  the  Epic  of  Lucan  was  an  earlier  ef- 
fort than  the  first  prolusions  of  Virgil.1 

Next  to  Liberty  Lucan  chanted  the  praises  of  Philosophy, 
and  his  views  of  the  one  had  as  little  of  truth  and  sense  as  of 
Lucan’s  views  the  other.  He  proclaimed  himself  a follower  of 
of  philosophy.  tjie  gtofog5  ana  n0  man  hag  set  forth  their  views, 
such  as  he  conceived  them,  with  more  spirited  and  sounding 
phrases.  If,  however,  we  examine  them,  we  discover  in  them 
all  the  vagueness  and  uncertainty  of  the  teaching  of  the 
day ; it  is  impossible  to  gather  from  the  verses  of  Lucan 
whether  the  poet  or  his  masters  believed  in  the  existence  of 
the  gods,  or  moral  government  of  the  world.  These  doc- 
trines are  repeatedly  asserted,  and  again  not  less  repeatedly 
denied.2  Fate,  the  idol  of  the  Stoics,  plays  a great  part  on 

1 Statius,  Sylv.  iL  7.  73. : 

“ Hsec  primo  juvenis  canes  sub  asvo 
Ante  annos  Culicis  Maroniani.” 

According  to  the  life  of  Lucan  ascribed  to  Suetonius,  this  was  the  poet’s  own 
boastful  comparison  : “ Et  quantum  mihi  restat  ad  Culicem  ! ” 

2 The  Pharsalia  is  full  of  auguries,  visions,  and  other  testimonies  to  super- 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


241 


the  Pharsalian  stage ; yet  once,  at  least,  the  poet  does  not 
scruple  to  declare  his  uncertainty  whether  Apollo  prophesies 
that  which  is  fated,  or  fate  is  that  which  Apollo  prophesies.1 
There  is,  however,  in  his  view  at  least  one  manifest  destiny, 
the  law  of  nature  which  justifies  Rome’s  dominion  over  the 
world.  While  he  throws  aside  the  old  contracted  notions  of 
the  individuality  of  nations,  and  affirms,  with  the  emphasis 
of  Seneca,  the  common  origin  and  rights  of  all  mankind,  he 
never  shrinks  from  the  glaring  inconsistency  of  his  creed  as 
a Roman  with  his  creed  as  a philosopher. 

Nevertheless  this  philosophy,  crude  as  it  is,  has  availed  to 
soften  his  feelings  at  least  in  one  particular.  No  Roman  poet 
dwells  with  such  warmth  as  Lucan  on  the  senti- 

i nr,  • His  senerai  de- 

ment of  conjugal  affection.  There  is  a sweetness  ficiency  in  im- 

in  more  than  one  passage  of  the  JPharsalia , where 
it  pauses  on  its  stately  march  to  indulge  in  a moments  ten- 
derness, which  little  harmonizes  with  its  author’s  general 
harshness,  and  may  he  taken  as  a tribute  perhaps  to  the 
merits  of  a consort  worthy  of  his  genius,  whose  devotion  to 
his  memory  was  recorded  in  fitting  strains  by  the  next  gen- 
eration.3 But  this  appreciation  of  the  gentle  influence  which 

natural  power : the  author  repeatedly  invokes  the  gods ; but  he  makes  no  use 
of  mythological  machinery,  and  more  than  once  expressly  denies  the  existence 
of  a superintending  Providence : vii.  447.  454. : 

“ Mentimur  regnare  Jovem  ....  mortalia  nulli 
Sunt  curata  Deo.” 

1 Phars.  v.  92. : 

“ Sive  canit  fatum,  seu,  quod  jubet  ipse,  canendo 
Fit  fatum.” 

2 Comp,  the  passion  of  Pompeius  and  Cornelia,  v.  725-815.,  viii.  40-158., 
ix.  51-116.  Even  the  sterner  esteem  of  Cato  and  Marcia  has  a touch  of  sen- 
timent and  enthusiasm. 

3 Statius,  1.  c.  120. : 

“ Adsis  lucidus,  et  vocante  Polla, 

Unum,  quaeso,  diem  Deos  silentum 
Exores ; solet  hoc  patere  limen 
Ad  nuptas  redeuntibus  maritis. 

Haec  te  non  thiasis  proeax  dolosis 
Falsi  numinis  induit  figuras ; 

VOL.  vi. — 16 


242 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


soothes  most  effectively  the  ills  of  life,  is  beyond  the  experi- 
ence of  youth,  and  shows  a power  of  imagination  in  Lucan 
which  we  miss  with  regret  in  many  passages  of  his  Epic  more 
brilliant  in  conception,  and  more  sonorous  in  language.  His 
general  deficiency  indeed  in  this  faculty  is  most  strikingly 
exhibited  in  the  descriptions  of  physical  suffering  in  which 
he  seems  to  revel.  His  ever-recurring  pictures  of  death  and 
wounds,  of  diseases  and  famines,  are  coarse  material  painting, 
in  which  he  only  aims  at  representing  vividly  the  scenes  he 
has  himself  witnessed  in  the  amphitheatres,  or  possibly  in 
the  streets  of  his  own  city.  He  has  treasured  up  in  his  mind 
all  the  horrors  which  have  been  presented  to  his  senses,  nor 
has  he  the  art  or  delicacy  to  create  the  effect  required  by 
generalities  and  abstractions.  This  is  the  common  fault  of 
young  writers  ; it  is  to  be  feared,  hoAxever,  that  it  was  emi- 
nently the  fault  of  the  age  also ; it  sprang  from  the  hard 
materialism  engendered  by  sensual  indulgence,  from  a terri- 
ble familiarity  with  objects  the  most  painful  and  disgusting, 
and  a cynical  freedom  of  life  and  conversation. 

Another  feature  of  Lucan’s  Pharsalia  is  its  affectation  of 
encyclopaedic  knowledge,  not  perhaps  characteristic  of  the 
man  himself  so  much  as  of  the  period  which 

Affectation  of  . A 

encyclopedic  boasted  the  vast  compilations  of  Strabo  s Geog- 
raphy and  Pliny’s  hi atural  History.  Astronomy 
and  astrology,  geography  mathematical  and  terrestrial,  anti- 
quities and  philosophy,  mythology  and  navigation, — all  these 
branches  of  science  have  their  attractions  for  the  young 
academician : wild  and  confused  as  his  views  of  them  often 
are,  caught  up  from  the  teaching  of  many  masters,  and  never 
as  it  seems  digested  in  the  mind  of  the  pupil,  they  exhibit 
the  appetite  of  the  age  for  indiscriminate  knowledge,  an  age 
of  facts  rather  than  of  principles.1  They  afford  a glimpse  of 

Ipsum  sed  colit  et  frequentet  ipsum, 

Imis  altius  insitum  medullis.” 

Comp.  Martial,  vii.  21. 

1 Among  other  passages  the  reader  may  be  referred  for  Lucan’s  ideas  of 
astronomy  to  ix.  531. ; of  astrology  to  i.  660. ; of  geography  to  i.  396.,  ii.  399., 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


243 


the  diversified  subjects  of  intellectual  occupation  and  moral 
interest  which  a world-wide  empire  afforded,  when  all  the 
races  of  mankind,  their  climes  and  their  characters,  seemed 
brought  into  one  focus.  Amidst  the  material  luxury  and  the 
rampant  vices  of  the  times,  they  show  that  there  was  still 
room  for  mental  cultivation,  which  must  have  kept  many 
hearts  pure  and  single,  and  arrested  the  degeneracy  of  society. 
By  literature,  and  possibly  by  domestic  interests,  Lucan 
seems  himself  to  have  been  saved  from  the  contagion  around 
him.  His  poem,  considering  the  atmosphere  of  voluptuous- 
ness in  which  he  moved,  is  singularly  free  from  all  indelicacy 
of  thought  and  language.1  Modesty,  indeed,  was  a tradition 
of  the  Roman  Epic  ; vices  which  passed  current  in  every  circle 
of  contemporary  society  are  never  so  much  as  named  by  the 
singers  of  the  life  heroic  : but  that  Lucan  should  exhibit  the 
same  instinct  as  Virgil,  that  Caesar  and  Pompeius  should  be 
robed  for  us  in  the  decent  drapery  of  iEneas  and  Turnus,  is 
much  to  the  credit  of  the  poet,  and  possibly  of  his  age  also. 
It  would  seem  that  amidst  the  general  dissolution  of  princi- 
ples some  ideas  retained  their  influence  and  enforced  a relig- 
ious self-restraint ; wild  as  was  the  licence  of  the  age,  it  had 
its  recognised  limits ; a certain  sense  of  decorum,  however 
illogical  we  may  deem  it,  still  preserved  its  sway  over  the 
chartered  libertines  of  Rome.2  It  may  be  added  that  while 

iii.  171.,  iv.  51.,  vi.  333.,  ix.  411.,  x.  268.;  of  history  to  ii.  69.,  x.  20. ; of  an- 
tiquities to  ix.  950. ; of  philosophy  to  ii.  L 286.,  ix.  564. ; of  mythology  to  iv. 
593.,  ix.  519. ; of  navigation  to  viii.  168. 

1 Lucan  is  described  to  us  as  a wealthy  idler : Juvenal,  vii.  79. 

“ Contentus  fama  jaceat  Lucanus  in  hortis  Marmoreis.” 

He  was  born  at  Corduba  in  Spain,  but  of  Roman  parents,  and  neither  his  fa- 
ther Hella,  nor  his  uncles  Seneca  and  Gallio,  betrayed  the  simplicity  of  a pro- 
vincial extraction.  The  notion  of  Quintilian  that  his  rhetorical  style  savoured 
of  Spanish  turgidity,  and  the  compliments  of  Statius  to  his  native  Baetis,  are 
more  fanciful  than  sound.  See  however  Sylv.  ii.  7.  33. : 

“ Attollat  refluos  in  astra  fontes 
Graio  nobelior  Melete  Baetis : 

Baetin,  Mantua,  provocare  noli.” 

2 The  purity  of  the  Pharsalia  is  equal  to  that  of  the  JEndd, \ and  the  same 


244 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


professed  philosophers  spoke  with  doubt  and  anxiety,  and  at 
best  with  faint  hope,  of  the  prospect  of  a future  state,  Lucan 
faithful  to  the  common  sentiment  of  poetry,  and  the  univer- 
sal aspirations  of  unsophisticated  nature,  expresses  at  one 
time  the  popular  belief  in  its  existence,  and  philosophic  con- 
ceptions of  its  character  at  another.1 

may  be  said  of  the  later  epics  of  Silius,  Statius,  and  Valerius  Flaccus.  Lucan’s 
moral  perceptions  are  more  just  than  Virgil’s ; bating  some  exaggerated  ex- 
pressions of  vindictiveness,  they  are  a very  fair  reflection  of  the  teaching  of 
his  masters  the  Stoics.  I must  censure,  however,  his  tenderness  for  the  scoun- 
drel Domitius,  who  dying  forsooth,  “ Venia  gaudet  caruisse  secunda.” — Phars. 
vii.  604. 

1 The  scorn  Lucan  throws  on  the  Druidical  doctrine  of  transmigration, 
i.  455.,  implies  no  denial  of  a spiritual  immortality.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
reality  of  the  future  life,  as  a state  of  retribution,  is  strongly  set  forth  in  many 
passages:  see  particularly  vi.  782.,  vii.  816.,  and  the  sublime  canonization  of 
Pompeius,  ix.  1. : 

“ At  non  in  Pharia  manes  jacuere  favilla, 

Nec  cinis  exiguus  tantam  compescuit  Umbram  : 

Prosiluit  busto,  semiustaque  membra  relinquens, 

Degeneremque  rogum,  sequitur  convexa  Tonantis.  . . . 

Semidei  Manes  habitant,  quos  ignea  virtus, 

Innocuos  vitae,  patientes  aetheris  imi 
Fecit,  et  cetemos  animam  collegit  in  orbes .” 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


245 


CHAPTEK  LV. 

THE  EMPEROR  NERO  : HIS  FIGURE  AND  CHARACTER. — THE  SENATE  : REDUCED  IN  NUM- 
BERS BY  PROSCRIPTION  ; LOWERED  IN  ESTIMATION : IMPOVERISHMENT  OF  THE  OLD 
FAMILIES,  BUT  GENERAL  INCREASE  OF  WEALTH  IN  THE  UPPER  RANKS. — THE  COM- 
MONALTY DIVIDED  INTO  TWO  CLASSES. — THE  PROVINCIALS : THE  PRAETORIANS  : 
THE  LEGIONS. — INDEPENDENCE  OF  THE  PROCONSULS. — ACCOUNT  OF  THE  GOVERN- 
MENT OF  SYRIA. — EXPLOITS  OF  CORBULO. — NERO  VISITS  GREECE  : HIS  PERSONAL 
DISPLAYS  THERE. — DEATH  OF  CORBULO. — INDIGNATION  OF  THE  ROMANS  AT  NERO’S 
SELF-ABASEMENT. — VINDEX  CONSPIRES  AGAINST  HIM. — REVOLT  OF  GALBA  AND 
VIRGINIUS. — GALBA  PROCLAIMED  EMPEROR  BY  HIS  SOLDIERS. — NERO’S  RETURN  TO 
ROME  AND  TRIUMPHAL  ENTRY. — HIS  DESPICABLE  PUSILLANIMITY. — HIS  LAST 
HOURS  AND  DEATH. — (a.  D.  66.,  A.  U.  819. — A.  D.  68.,  A.  U.  821.) 

BENEATH  the  ostensible  records  which  have  been  left 
ns  of  the  last  three  Caesars,  we  may  seem  to  detect 
traces,  as  it  were,  now  almost  obliterated,  of 

7 7 . . 7 The  account  of 

another  and  more  legitimate  writing.  It  may  Nero  given  by 

. . our  authorities 

not  be  impossible,  1 conceive,  to  reconstruct  the  must  be  ac- 
true  character  of  Tiberius,  by  freeing  it  from  the  stantiaiiy  cor- 
distortions  of  the  glosses  with  which  it  has  been  ec ' 
overlaid.  If  there  remain  less  distinct  traces  of  the  real 
portraiture  of  Caius  and  Claudius,  we  have  discovered  never- 
theless unquestionable  evidence  of  gross  perversions  of  the 
truth,  which  must  throw  doubt  on  the  genuineness  of  the 
lineaments  in  which  they  have  been  commonly  presented. 
With  regard  to  Nero,  however,  the  case,  it  must  be  allowed, 
is  different.  The  invalidation,  indeed,  of  the  testimony  of 
Tacitus,  Suetonius,  and  Dion  in  the  earlier  instances  renders 
them  justly  suspected  in  this  also ; the  accounts  of  the  two 
last-named  writers  especially  seem  in  some  respects  quite  in- 
credible : nevertheless  I am  constrained  to  add  that  no  out- 


246 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


lines  of  a truer  character  are  elsewhere  discoverable,  and  with 
some  allowance  only  for  extravagance  of  colouring,  we  must 
accept  in  the  main  the  verisimilitude  of  the  picture  they  have 
left  us  of  this  arch-tyrant,  the  last  and  the  most  detestable  of 
the  Caesarean  family. 

The  youth  who  at  the  age  of  seventeen  years  was  called 
to  govern  the  civilized  world,  is  represented  in  his  busts  and 
medals  as  handsome  in  countenance,  but,  as  Sue- 

Description  of  . . 

Ms  figure  and  tomus  remarks,  without  grace  or  wmmngness  of 
expression.1 2  His  hair  was  not  the  bright  auburn 
of  Apollo,  the  delight  of  the  Homans,  to  which  it  was  so 
often  likened,  but  yellowish  or  sandy  : his  figure,  though  of 
middle  stature,  was  ill-proportioned,  the  neck  was  thick  and 
sensual,  the  stomach  prominent,  the  legs  slender.  His  skin, 
it  is  added,  was  blotched  or  pimpled ; but  this,  it  may  be  sup- 
posed, was  the  effect  of  intemperance  in  his  later  years  ; his 
eyes  were  dark  gray  or  greenish,  and  their  sight  defective, 
which  may  account  perhaps  for  the  scowl  which  seems  to 
mark  their  expression.  His  health,  notwithstanding  his  ex- 
cesses, continued  good  to  the  end,  and  it  was  only  from 
anxious  concern  for  his  voice  that  he  wrapped  his  throat  in 
kerchiefs,  like  a confirmed  valetudinarian.3  In  his  dress  there 
was  a mixture  of  slovenliness  and  finery ; in  the  arrangement 
of  his  cherished  locks  he  was  exceedingly  careful,  piling  them 
in  tiers  above  the  crown,  and  letting  them  fall  from  thence 
over  the  shoulders,  a fashion  which  was  reputed  not  less  in- 
decent, or  at  least  effeminate,  than  the  looseness  of  his  cinc- 
ture, the  bareness  of  his  feet,  and  the  lightness  of  the  cham- 
ber-robe in  which  he  did  not  scruple  to  appear  in  public.3 

1 Suet.  Ner.  51.:  “ Vultu  pulchro  magis  quam  venusto.”  This  distinction 
between  “ pulcher  ” and  “ venustus  ” is  well  supported  from  the  authorities 
by  Dcederlein.  Comp,  especially  Catull.  lxxxvi.  On  the  passage  in  Suetonius 
he  makes  the  comment : “ d.  h.  er  hatte  mehr  vollkommen  und  regelmassig 
Schone  als  angenehme  Ziige,  und  war  also  eine  herzlose  kalte  Schonheit  zu  der 
sich  niemand  hingezogen  fiihlt.” — Synonym,  iii.  52. 

2 Suet.  1.  c. 

8 Suet.  1.  c. : “ Synthesinam  indutus : ” explained  by  the  commentators  by 
“ vestem  cubitoriam  ” (xitojviov  avdivov , Dion,  lxiii.  13.),  the  “ thalassina  ves- 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


247 


We  may  trace  perhaps  to  the  character  of  his  master,  and 
to  the  kind  of  education  he  was  likely  to  receive  from  him, 
the  ardent  love  of  admiration,  ill-directed  as  it  Nero,s  love  of 
was,  which  distinguished  the  pupil  of  Seneca.  To  admirati011- 
this  constant  anxiety  to  compete  with  rivals,  and  triumph 
over  them,  however  trifling  the  objects  on  which  it  was  ex- 
ercised, may  be  ascribed  the  indifference  ISTero  evidently  felt 
to  the  title  of  divinity,  which  in  his  inordinate  vanity  he 
might  have  been  expected  to  claim.1  He  wanted  to  be  ad- 
mired as  the  first  among  men,  not  to  be  adored  as  a god.  He 
could  not  be  Apollo,  and  contend  at  the  same  time  for  the 
prize  of  the  Pythian  games : he  could  not  be  Hercules,  and 
carry  off  the  chaplet  at  Nemea  : he  could  not  be  Jupiter,  and 
gain  the  victory  at  the  great  contest  of  Olympia  ; — distinc- 
tions on  which  his  soul  was  bent  from  an  early  period  of  his 
career,  and  which,  as  we  shall  see,  he  lived  eventually  to 
achieve.  His  courtiers  might,  if  they  pleased,  pronounce  his 
likeness  to  these  or  any  other  divinities ; but  to  make  him  act- 
ually divine  was  to  rob  him  of  the  honours  he  so  vehement- 
ly affected.  The  poets  might  predict  his  apotheosis  after 
death,  and  doubtless  the  verses  in  which  Lucan,  at  that  time 
his  friend  and  companion,  challenged  him  to  choose  what  god- 
ship  he  would  assume  in  heaven,  and  where  he  would  fix  his 
throne  ; imploring  him  to  take  his  seat  in  the  middle  of  the 
universe,  lest  if  he  leaned  ever  so  little  from  the  centre  the 
world  should  be  thrown  by  his  august  weight  from  its  eter- 

tis,”  as  I conceive,  of  Lucretius.  The  long  loose  robe  was  the  garb  also  of  the 
lyrist : “ Statuas  suas  citharoedico  habitu,”  &c.  Suet.  Her.  25.  Eckhel  com- 
pares Virgil,  JEn.  vi.  645. : 

“ Necnon  Threicius  longa  cum  veste  sacerdos 
Obloquitur  numeris  septem  discrimina  vocum.” 

1 We  have  seen  how  the  proposal  of  Anicius  Cerialis  to  erect  a temple  to 
Nero  was  repudiated.  Tac.  Ann.  xv.  ult.  It  should  be  remarked,  however, 
that  there  are  specimens  of  gold  and  silver  medals,  the  imperial  coinage,  in 
which  the  head  of  Nero  is  encircled  with  rays.  These  may  be  regarded  as  an 
emblem  of  divinity,  unless  they  are  meant  only  to  indicate  his  rivalry  with  the 
sun-god  Apollo.  See  Eckhel,  vi.  269.  The  bust  of  Nero  in  the  Louvre  is  also 
radiated.  Muller,  Archceol.  der  Kunst.  198. 


248 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


nal  balance ; — such  verses  were  doubtless  accepted  as  a fitting 
tribute  to  the  germ  of  a divine  existence  hereafter  to  blossom 
into  flower.1  But  the  ardour  with  which  Nero  aspired  to  dis- 
tinctions among  mortal  men  was  itself  a guarantee  against 
his  usurping  the  character  of  the  impassive  godhead,  which 
can  neither  enjoy  a triumph  nor  suffer  a disgrace. 

Nor  again,  though  described  by  Tacitus  as  lusting  after  the 
incredible , had  Nero  the  same  passion  as  Caius  for  realizing  ap- 
parent impossibilities  to  prove  his  superhuman 

His  vulgar  1 . 1 . . „ , . n 

ideas  of  mag-  power.  He  was  not  impelled  m a career  ot  mar- 

nificence.  • , 

vels  by  restless  and  aimless  pride.  Once  remov- 
ed from  the  sphere  of  theatrical  shows  and  contests,  he  had 
no  higher  notion  of  his  position  than  as  enabling  him  to  ac- 
cumulate, to  multiply,  or  to  enlarge  the  commonest  objects 
of  luxury.  He  never  travelled,  it  is  asserted,  with  less  than 

1 Lucan,  i.  45. : 

“ Te,  cum  statione  peracta 
Astra  petes  serus,  praelati  regia  coeli 
Accipiet,  gaudente  polo : seu  sceptra  tenere, 

Seu  te  flammigeros  Phoebi  conscendere  currus, 

Telluremque  nihil  mutato  Sole  timentem 

Igne  vago  lustrare  juvet ; tibi  numine  ab  omni 

Cedetur,  jurisque  tui  Natura  relinquet 

Quis  Deus  esse  velis,  ubi  regnum  ponere  Mundi.  . . . 

^Etheris  immensi  partem  si  presseris  unam 
Sentiet  axis  onus ; librati  pondera  coeli 
Orbe  tene  medio.” 

In  the  fragment  ascribed  to  the  poet  Tumus,  the  Muses  are  accused  of  pros- 
tituting themselves  to  Nero,  and  paying  him  divine  honours : 

“ Quis  genus  ab  Jove  summo, 

Asse  merent  vili,  ac  sancto  se  corpore  foedant  . . . 

Proh ! Furias  et  monstra  colunt  . . . et  quicquid  Olympi  est 
Transcripsere  Erebo.  Jamque  impia  ponere  templa 
Sacrilegasque  audent  aras,  coeloque  repulsos 
Quondam  Terrigenas  superis  imponere  regnis 
Qua  licet ; et  stolido  verbis  illuditur  orbi.” 

2 Tacitus  calls  him  “ incredibilium  cupitot,”  Ann.  xv.  42.,  specially  with 
reference  to  his  project  of  a canal  from  Avernus  to  Ostia.  He  seems  greatly 
to  exaggerate  the  difficulties  of  the  undertaking ; perhaps  his  best  comment 
upon  it  is : “ nec  satis  causae.” 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


249 


a thousand  carriages  in  his  train.  His  banquets  were  those 
of  the  noble  debauchees  of  the  day  on  a still  vaster  scale  of 
expense : in  the  height  of  his  extravagance,  he  would  equip 
his  actors  with  masks  or  wands  covered  with  genuine  pearls ; 
he  would  stake  four  hundred  thousand  sesterces  on  a single 
cast  of  the  dice ; he  bathed  in  unguents,  and  stimulated  his 
friends  to  expend  four  millions  on  the  perfumes  alone  of  a 
single  supper.1  His  presents  to  favourites  were  sums  of 
money  so  many  times  greater  than  had  ever  been  given  to 
favourites  before;2 3  his  buildings  were  colonnades  longer, 
halls  wider,  towers  higher  than  had  been  raised  by  his  pre- 
decessors. His  projected  canal  from  Puteoli  to  Rome  would 
only  have  been  the  longest  of  canals ; the  attempt  he  latter- 
ly made  to  cut  through  the  isthmus  of  Corinth  was  only  a 
repetition  of  previous  attempts,  neither  better  planned,  nor 
more  steadfastly  persevered  in.  In  his  schemes  there  was 
nothing  new  or  original.  ISTero  was  devoid  of  the  imagina- 
tion which  throws  an  air  of  wild  grandeur  over  the  charac- 
ter of  C-aius.  The  notion  that  he  burnt  Rome  on  purpose  to 
have  an  opportunity  of  rebuilding  it  more  magnificently 
would  have  been  more  applicable,  as  it  seems  to  me,  to  his 
predecessor  than  to  him.  But  within  the  paltry  sphere  of 
his  degraded  taste  he  claimed  to  be  pre-eminent.  As  a mime 
or  player  he  was  not  satisfied  with  any  single  class  of  parts, 
or  any  one  department  of  exhibition.  After  rivalling  Apollo 
in  song  and  the  Sun  in  charioteering,  he  aspired  to  display 
the  courage  and  vigour  of  Hercules,  and  a lion  His  teste  for 
was  duly  prepared,  drugged  or  fed  to  stupor,  to  p^0^?5' 
be  strangled  in  his  arms,  or  brained  with  a stroke  JSSe  rfdeoen- 
of  his  club.8  He  acted,  he  sang,  he  played,  he  c^- 
danced.  He  insisted  on  representing  men  and  heroes,  gods 

1 Suet.  Her.  27.;  Plin.  Hist.  Hat.  xxxvii.  6.;  Oros.  vii.  7. 

2 Nero,  it  is  said,  threw  in  his  lifetime  as  much  as  2200  millions  of  sesterces 
(17,600,000?.)  to  his  courtiers  and  freedmen.  Tac.  Hist.  i.  20.  He  covered 
the  theatre  of  Pompeius  with  gilding  in  one  day,  to  exhibit  it  to  his  royal  vis- 
itor Tiridates.  Plin.  H.  H.  xxxiii.  16. 

3 Suet.  Her.  53. 


250 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


and  even  goddesses.  To  affect  the  woman  indeed,  in  dress, 
voice,  and  gesture,  was  a transformation  in  which  he 
took  a childish  pleasure,  restrained  by  no  sense  of  dignity  or 
His  supersti-  decency.  He  adopted  his  superstitions,  as  well 
tion*  as  his  garb  and  habits,  from  Syria,  from  his  Par- 

thian and  Armenian  guests,  or  from  the  diviners  and  necro- 
mancers of  the  credulous  East.  To  the  art  of  magic  he  de- 
voted wealth,  energy,  natural  abilities,  in  short,  all  his  re- 
sources ; hut  Hature,  says  Pliny,  was  too  strong  for  him.1 
His  failure  to  divine  the  future,  or  raise  the  spirits  of  the 
dead,  was  noted  by  the  wise  as  a signal  demonstration  of  the 
futility  of  magical  pretensions.  For  none  of  the  accustomed 
divinities  of  Rome  did  he  evince  any  respect,  nor  for  places 
consecrated  by  the  national  religion  ; but  he  reverenced  the 
Syrian  Astarte,  till  in  a fit  of  vexation  he  renounced  her  pro- 
tection, and  insulted  her  image.  At  last  his  sole  object  of 
veneration  was  a little  figure  of  a girl,  which  he  always  wore 
as  a talisman  about  him,  and  affected  to  learn  from  it  the  se- 
crets of  futurity.2 

Such  were  the  miserable  interests  of  this  infatuated  crea- 
ture, the  victim  of  licentious  indulgence,  a child  prematurely 
stunted  both  in  mind  and  body,  surrounded  on  the  throne 
not  by  generals  and  statesmen,  but  by  troops  of  slaves  or 
freedmen,  by  players  and  dancers  lost  to  all  sense  of  decency 
themselves,  and  seeking  only  their  advancement  at  the  ex- 
pense of  their  master  and  of  mankind  ; surrendered  by  loose 
women  to  still  more  despicable  minions,  and  ruled  by  the 

1 Suet.  Her.  34. : “ Quin  et  facto  per  Magos  sacro  evocare  manes  et  exo- 

rare  tentavit.”  Plin.  Hist.  Hat.  xxx.  5. : “ Imperare  Dis  concupivit 

ad  hsec  non  opes  ei  defuere,  non  vires,  non  discentis  ingenium,  aliaque,  non  pa- 
tiente  mundo.  Immensum,  et  indubitatmn  exemplum  est  falsae  artis  quam  de- 
reliquit  Nero.” 

2 Suet.  Her.  56. : “ Religionum  usquequaque  contemptor,  praeter  unius 
Deae  Syriae.  Hanc  mox  ita  sprevit,  ut  urina  contaminaret.  . . . icunculam 
puellarem  colere  perseveravit.”  Tacitus  relates,  Ann.  xiv.  22.,  how  Nero 
bathed  from  mere  caprice  in  the  spring  of  the  Aqua  Marcia,  which  was  de- 
clared sacred,  doubtless  to  protect  from  impurities  the  water  to  be  drunk  at 
Rome.  A sickness  which  followed  was  ascribed  to  the  anger  of  the  Nymph. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


251 


most  cruel  and  profligate  of  ministers.  Helius  and  Tigelli- 
nus,  Doryphorus  and  Sporus,  are  among  the  most  hateful 
names  of  the  imperial  history ; into  the  abominations  of  their 
career  it  would  be  pollution  merely  to  look.  No  wonder  that, 
when  encircled  by  so  loathsome  a crew,  he  saw  the  proud 
citizens  prostrate  at  his  feet,  he  could  exclaim  that  no  prince 
before  him  had  known  the  extent  of  his  power.1 

. _ x Nero’s  unwor- 

But  though  at  their  patron  s command  statues  thy  favourites 

, ~ despised  and 

and  arches  might  rise  m honour  of  these  infamous  shunned  by  the 
companions,  it  may  be  said  for  the  credit  of  the 
people,  that  they  received  much  less  of  lip-worship  than  their 
predecessors,  Sejanus,  Pallas,  and  Narcissus.  There  seems 
indeed  to  have  risen,  at  least  in  the  later  years  of  this  prin- 
cipate,  a marked  separation  between  the  court  and  the  nobil- 
ity : the  senators  shrank  from  the  presence  of  a man  who  so 
openly  degraded  his  name  and  lineage ; they  fled  the  con- 
tact of  his  dissolute  associates  ; they  entered  into  widespread 
conspiracies  against  him,  to  which  they  had  never  been  pro- 
voked by  the  tyranny  of  his  predecessors  ; and  they  had  the 
merit  of  incurring  his  petulant  displeasure,  with  many  a 
threat  to  extinguish  their  order  altogether,  and  give  the  prov- 
inces to  his  knights  and  freedmen.  I hate  you , Ccesar , ex- 
claimed the  most  refined  of  his  flatterers,  because  you  are  a 
senator .2  Accordingly  this  emperor,  notwithstanding  the 

pomp  and  splendour  of  his  shows  and  public  appearances, 
seems  to  have  been  left  for  the  most  part  to  the  mercenary  at- 
tendance of  his  personal  favourites,  protected  only  by  a troop 
of  spies  and  informers,  and  the  vilest  portion  of  the  pamper- 
ed populace,  from  the  general  detestation  of  respectable 
citizens.3 

1 Suet.  Ner.  37.  “ Elatus,  inflatusque  ....  negavit  quemquam  principum 

scisse  quid  sibi  liceret.” 

2 Yatinius  in  Dion,  lxiii.  15. : [ucu  as,  Kaicap , bn  cvyidTjnK.bg  si.  Comp. 
Suet.  Ner.  37. 

3 Strange  stories  are  told  of  the  efforts  Nero  made  to  retain  the  better  por- 
tion of  the  citizens  as  spectators  of  his  entertainments,  which  they  found,  it  is 
said,  insufferably  tedious.  See  Dion,  1.  c.  ogts  nvag  ....  'irpocTroteicOai  re 


252 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


The  cruelties  of  Nero’s  later  years  were  the  more  fearful 
perhaps  from  their  apparent  caprice.  He  had  no  politic  ob- 
ject, such  as  may  be  ascribed  to  Tiberius:  of 

His  cruelties  " J . 

capricious,  not  policy  indeed  he  was  incapable.  Except  that  his 

politic.  r j . r r 

murders  were  commonly  prompted  by  need  or 
fear,  and  therefore  fell  oftenest  on  the  rich  and  powerful,  it 
can  hardly  be  said  that  one  class  suffered  from  them  more 
terribly  than  another.  His  family,  his  friends,  the  senators, 
the  knights,  philosophers,  and  Christians,  Romans  and  pro- 
vincials, were  all  decimated  by  them.  The  natural  tender- 
ness of  his  timid  and  pliant  conscience  once  seared  by  crime, 
there  remained  no  moral  strength  to  resist  any  evil  sugges- 
tion : his  conduct  was  that  of  mere  selfish  instinct,  without 
an  emotion  of  pity  or  compunction.  Even  the  terrors  of 
guilt  touched  him  lightly  and  passed  away  rapidly. 

Undoubtedly,  however,  the  senate  furnished  the  longest 
list  of  victims  to  the  tyrant’s  barbarity.  The  greatest  and 
Proscriptions  noblest  were  the  most  exposed  to  the  prince’s 
of  the  senate.  evil  eye,  which  lighted  upon  them  equally  at 
public  ceremonials  and  private  receptions,  and  marked  them 
for  immolation  at  every  fresh  burst  of  ill-humour. 

Its  numbers  re-  ..  _ 

duced  under  the  I he  proscriptions  to  which  this  body  was  sub- 
(SSiMi0Cae- e jected  under  the  four  Claudian  Caesars  reduced 
its  numbers  considerably,  more  indeed,  it  may 
be  imagined,  than  was  replaced  by  the  ordinary  sources  of 
replenishment.  Claudius,  among  his  other  reforms,  sought 
to  restore  the  balance  by  a special  measure,  and  such  was 
probably  the  object  of  his  revision  of  the  senate,  the  last  of 
the  kind  we  read  of ; but  the  decline  must  have  been  acceler- 
ated under  Nero,  without  check  or  counteraction.  Nero, 
reckless  equally  of  the  past  and  future,  felt  no  anxiety  to 
maintain  the  numbers  of  that  historic  assembly : and  the 
various  causes,  besides  the  emperor’s  tyranny,  which  were 
always  at  work  to  extinguish  the  oldest  families,  must  have 


tKdvTjanELV , Kal  v£Kpa)v  diKTjv  £K  tg)v  &iarpuv  £K<p£p£oOai.  But  we  may  hopo 
there  was  some  moral  indignation  in  their  disgust 


A.  TJ.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


253 


acted  with  terrible  force  on  the  effete  branches  of  the  ancient 
aristocracy.  But  if  its  numbers  were  reduced,  no  less  were 
its  employments  also.  Under  the  lax  discipline  of  Xero  and 
Tigellinus  appointments  to  office  abroad  would  be  the  prize  of 
interest  and  favour,  guided  neither  by  routine  norby  discretion : 
at  home  the  boards  and  commissions  established  by  Augustus 
would  fall  into  disuse.  Pensions  and  sinecures,  though  such 
corruptions  are  not  known  to  us  at  Rome  by  name,  would 
doubtless  abound,  but  of  real  business  there  would  be  less  and 
less.  Intrigue  and  peculation  would  flourish  in  a soil  pro- 
tected from  the  air  of  public  opinion,  and  the  strong  hand  of 
central  control.  The  passive  endurance  which  Its  estimation 
marked  the  conduct  of  the  senate  under  the  im- 
perial  persecutions  seems  to  bespeak  a conscious-  zens- 
ness  of  its  own  guilt  towards  the  state,  and  it  compounded 
for  its  monopoly  of  unquestioned  abuses  by  bowing  to  the 
yoke  of  a jealous  and  domineering  master.  We  discover  in 
Seneca  no  reliance  on  the  senate.  He  never  speaks  of  it  as  a 
living  guardian  of  the  virtues  of  Roman  society.  And  yet, 
notwithstanding  this  abandonment  of  its  high  prerogative,  it 
still  exercised  a moral  power.  Its  mere  title  could  awaken 
associations  which  thrilled  from  pulse  to  pulse.  It  was  still 
regarded  by  the  men  of  ancient  name  and  blood  as  the  true 
head  or  heart  of  the  empire,  rather  than  the  upstart  Claudius 
or  Domitius,  who  might  wear  the  purple  and  wield  the  sword. 
To  the  men  of  words  and  phrases  the  emperor  was  still  an 
accident, — the  senate  was  an  eternal  fact, — at  a time  when 
rhetoric  might  make  revolutions,  though  it  could  not  re- 
generate society.  To  them  it  was  still  the  symbol  of  liberty, 
at  a time  when  liberty  and  Caesar  were  regarded  as  two 
gladiators  sword  in  hand,  pitted  against  each  other  in  mortal 
combat.1  This  venerable  image  of  its  ancient  majesty  was 
preserved  to  it  by  the  proscriptions  themselves  by  which  it 


1 Lucan,  yii.  694. : 

“ Non  jam  Pompeii  nomen  populare  per  orbem, 

Nec  studium  belli ; sed  par  quod  semper  habemus 
Libertas  et  Caesar  erunt” 


254 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


suffered ; for  as  often  as  a murdered  Scribonius  or  Pompeius 
was  replaced  in  the  chairs  of  office  by  a Rubellius,  a Lollius, 
or  a Yitellius,  the  principle  of  its  vitality  was  in  fact  invigor- 
ated by  the  infusion  of  new  plebeian  blood.1 

As  fast  indeed  as  the  tyrant’s  exigencies  required  the  con- 
fiscation of  the  great  estates  of  nobles,  and  the  overthrow  of 
great  families,  his  caprice  and  favour  were  ele- 

Impoverish-  ”,  . . 

ment  of  the  old  vatmg  new  men  irom  the  inferior  orders  to  suc- 
ceed to  their  distinctions,  and  to  rival  them  in 
their  vast  possessions.  Nero  never  kept  his  money.  All  he 
robbed,  all  he  extorted,  was  squandered  as  abruptly  as  it  was 
acquired,  and  shrewd  Roman  money-makers  were  always 
waiting  upon  his  necessities,  and  sweeping  the  properties  of 
his  victims  into  their  stores  for  a small  part  of  their  value  in 
specie.  Of  the  vast  sums  amassed  by  the  freedmen  of  Clau- 
dius and  his  successors  some  records  have  been  preserved  to 
us ; but  the  freedmen  were  a class  peculiarly  obnoxious  to 
remark,  and  it  is  probable  that  knights  and  senators  were  at 
the  same  time,  and  by  similar  compliances,  raising  fortunes 
not  less  enormous,  who  have  escaped  the  designating  finger 
of  history.  Though  the  grinding  processes  to  which  the 
colossal  properties  of  the  nobles  were  subjected  must  on  the 
whole  have  broken  down  the  average  amount  of  their  reve- 
nues far  below  the  rate  at  which  it  figured  under  the  republic 
and  the  first  Caesars,  we  must  not  suppose  that  the  current 
set  all  in  one  direction,  or  that  the  age  of  Claudius  and  Nero 
was  not  also  a period  of  great  private  accumulations.  The 
But  general  in-  wealth  of  individuals  and  of  the  upper  ranks  at 
Sethe?ppe?lth  R°me  generally  reached  perhaps  its  greatest 
classes.  height  at  this  culminating  epoch. 

Descending,  however,  from  the  high  places  of  the  Roman 

1 Champagny  gives  a list  of  the  new  consular  families  of  the  period  of  the 
Caesars : “ the  iElia,  Annaea,  Arruntia,  Asinia,  Cocceia,  Hateria,  Junia,  Lollia, 
Memmia,  Octavia,  Plautia,  Pomponia,  Poppaea,  Rubellia,  Salvia,  Silia,  Vipsania, 
Vitellia,  Volusia.  From  henceforth  we  lose  sight  of  many  famous  names  of 
the  republic ; such  as  the  Atilia,  Fulvia,  Horatia,  Hortensia,  Hostilia,  Li  via,  Lu- 
cretia,  Papiria,  Porcia,  Postumia,  Veturia.” 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


255 


The  common- 
alty divided  in- 
to two  classes. 


1.  The  clients 
of  the  old  no- 
bility. 


world,  we  find  beneath  them  a commonalty  suffering  also  a 
social  revolution,  undergoing  a rapid  transition, 
and  presenting  the  elements  of  two  rival  classes, 
or  even  hostile  camps,  in  the  bosom  of  the  city. 

The  clients  and  retainers  of  the  old  nobility, 
whether  freed  or  free  born,  still  formed  the  pith 
and  marrow  of  the  commonwealth:  still  lean- 
ing their  humble  tenements  against  the  great  lords’  man- 
sions, still  respecting  them  as  their  patrons  and  advisers, 
still  attending  their  levees,  and  waiting  for  the  daily  com- 
pliment of  the  sportula  at  their  doors,  they  regarded  them 
as  the  real  chiefs  of  the  state,  and  held  them  equals  of  Caesar 
himself.  The  death  or  exile  of  their  august  protector 
might  strike  them  with  surprise  and  indignation ; but  when 
they  looked  around  and  counted  their  numbers,  they  felt 
their  own  insignificance,  and  quailed  beneath  the  blow  in 
silence.  They  saw  that  there  was  growing  up  2 The  patron_ 
beside  them  a vast  class  of  patronless  proletaries,  lheSiazzarm!ieoi 
the  scum  of  the  streets  and  lanes,  slaves,  freed-  ancient  Eome- 
men,  foreigners,  men  of  base  trades  and  infamous  employ- 
ments, or  of  ruined  fortunes,  who,  having  none  but  Caesar 
himself  to  depend  on,  through  the  weight  of  their  numbers 
in  his  scale,  and  earned  his  doles  and  entertainments  by  lav- 
ish caresses,  and  deeds  corresponding  to  their  promises.1 
These  have  been  called  the  lazzaroni  of  ancient  Rome : in 
idleness,  indeed,  and  mendicancy  they  deserve  the  title ; but 
they  were  the  paupers  of  a world- wide  empire,  and  the 
crumbs  on  which  they  fed  fell  from  the  tables  of  kings  and 
princes.  The  wealth  of  millions  of  subjects  was  lavished  on 
these  mendicant  masters.  For  days  together,  on  the  oft-re- 
curring occasion  of  an  imperial  festival,  valuables  of  all  kinds 
were  thrown  pell-mell  among  them,  rare  and  costly  birds 
were  lavished  upon  them  by  thousands,  provisions  of  every 


1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  4.  (a  precious  passage,  as  Champagny  justly  terms  it,  in 
which  the  historian  marks  this  distinction  of  classes  in  the  populace) : “ Pars 
populi  integra  et  magnis  domibus  annexa,  clientes  libertique  damnatorum  et 
exsulum : . . . . plebs  sordida  et  circo  ac  theatris  sueta,  simul  deterrimi  ser- 
vorum,  aut  qui  adesis  bonis  per  dedecus  Neronis  alebantur.” 


256 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  66. 


kind,  costly  robes,  gold  and  silver,  pearls  and  jewels,  pictures, 
slaves,  and  horses,  and  even  tamed  wild  beasts : at  last,  in 
the  progress  of  this  wild  profusion,  ships,  houses,  and  estates 
were  bestowed  by  lottery  on  these  waiters  upon  Caesar’s 
providence.1 2  This  extravagance  was  retained  without  relax- 
ation throughout  Nero’s  reign : had  he  paused  in  it  for  a mo- 
ment the  days  of  his  power  would  have  been  few.  The 
rumour  that  he  was  about  to  quit  Rome  for  the  East  caused 
murmurs  of  discontent,  and  forced  him  to  consult  the  gods, 
and  pretend  to  be  deterred  by  signs  of  their  displeasure  from 
carrying  his  design  into  effect.3  When  at  last,  as  we  shall 
see,  he  actually  visited  Greece,  he  left  behind  him  a confi- 
dential minister,  to  keep  the  stream  of  his  liberality  flowing, 
at  whatever  cost  and  by  whatever  measures  of  spoliation. 
Absent  or  present,  he  flung  to  these  pampered  supporters  a 
portion  of  every  confiscated  fortune;  the  emperor  and  his 
people  hunted  together,  and  the  division  of  the  prey  was 
made  apparently  to  the  satisfaction  of  both  equally.  Capri- 
cious as  were  the  blows  he  dealt  around  him,  this  class  alone 
he  took  care  never  to  offend,  and  even  the  charge  of  firing 
the  city  fell  lightly  on  the  ears  of  the  almost  houseless  multi- 
tude, whose  losses  at  least  had  been  fully  compensated  by 
plunder.  The  clients  of  the  condemned  nobles  were  kept 
effectually  in  check  by  this  hungry  crowd,  yelling  over  every 
carcass  with  the  prospect  of  a feast.  Nero,  in  the  height  of 
his  tyranny  and  alarm,  had  no  need  to  increase  the  number 
of  his  praetorians : the  lazzaroni  of  Rome  were  a body-guard 
surrounding  him  in  every  public  place,  and  watching  the  en- 
trances and  exits  at  his  palace  gates. 

Such  were  the  chief  distinctions  of  class  at  this  period 

among  the  Roman  people,  the  so-called  lords  of  mankind, 

The  rovin  an<l  beyond  them  lay  the  great  world  of  pro- 

ciais,  or  sub-  vincials,  their  subjects.  But  if  these  were  sub- 
jects of  Rome.  . **  . _ , 

jects  m name,  they  were  now  become  m tact  the 

1 Suet.  Ner.  11. ; Dion,  lxi.  18. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  36. : “ Deseruit  inceptum Haec  atque  talia  plebi 

volentia  fuere  voluptatum  cupidine,”  &c. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


257 


true  Roman  people ; they  alone  retained  real  freedom  of  ac- 
tion within  the  limits  of  the  empire ; they  were  allowed  to 
labour,  and  they  enjoyed  the  bulk  at  least  of  the  fruits  of  in- 
dustry ; they  rarely  say  the  hateful  presence  of  the  emperor, 
and  knew  only  by  report  the  loathsome  character  of  his 
courtiers  and  their  orgies.  And  if  sometimes  the  thunder- 
bolt might  fall  among  them,  it  struck  only  the  highest  emi- 
nences ; the  multitude  was  safe  as  it  was  innocent.  The  ex- 
tortion of  the  proconsul  in  the  province  was  not  to  be  com- 
pared in  wantonness  or  severity  with  the  reckless  pillage  of 
the  emperor  in  the  capital,  nearer  home.  The  petulance  of  a 
proconsul’s  wife  was  hardly  tolerated  abroad,  while  at  home 
the  prince’s  worst  atrocities  were  stimulated  by  female  cupid- 
ity. The  taxation  of  the  subject,  if  heavier  in  some  respects 
than  that  of  the  citizen,  was  at  least  tolerably  regular : the 
extraordinary  demands  which  Nero  made  towards  the  re- 
building of  Rome  were  an  exception  to  the  routine  of  fiscal 
imposts.  But,  above  all,  the  provincials  had  changed  place 
with  their  masters  in  being  now  the  armed  force  of  the  em- 
pire. The  citizen  had  almost  ceased  to  wield  the  sword. 
Even  the  praetorians  were  recruited  from  Italy,  not  from 
Rome  herself ; and  among  them  thousands  were  doubtless 
foreign-born,  the  offscourings  of  the  provinces,  who  had 
thrown  themselves  on  the  shores  of  Italy  to  seek  their  for- 
tunes in  a sphere  abandoned  by  the  indolence  of  their  mas- 
ters. The  praetorian,  like  the  proletary  of  the  city,  was 
highly  cherished  by  the  emperor.  He  had  his 

. . J J ..A  ......  , The  praetorians 

rights  and  privileges  which  raised  him  above  recruited  in 
every  other  military  conscript.  While  the  le-  Ital7‘ 
gionary  served  at  ten  ases  a day  for  thirty  or  forty  years  ex- 
posed to  the  risk  of  war,  fatigue,  and  climate,  nor  regained 
his  liberty  and  safety  till  age  had  blanched  his  hair  and  stiff- 
ened his  limbs,  the  praetorian  lived  quietly  at  Rome  under 
the  lax  discipline  of  a stative  camp  ; he  enjoyed  double  pay, 
and  claimed  dismissal  after  sixteen  years’  service.  He  had 
his  regular  dole  of  corn,  his  occasional  largess,  his  extraordi- 
nary donative  whenever  an  opportunity  had  occurred  to 
VOL.  vi. — 17 


258 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  I).  66. 


prove  his  fidelity.  Tiberius,  on  the  fall  of  Sejanus,  had  given 
him  1000  ases  ; Claudius  had  paid  for  the  purple  with  a sum 
of  150  millions  of  sesterces;  Nero  had  followed  these  exam- 
ples, and  established  them  as  the  rule  of  the  succession  : on 
the  overthrow  of  Piso’s  conspiracy  he  had  requited  his  prae- 
torians with  2000  sesterces  apiece.1 2  Thus  caressed,  the  fa- 
voured cohorts  of  the  guard  became  the  firmest  support  of 
the  prince  their  creature,  and  under  the  sway  of  military  tra- 
ditions, from  which  even  they  were  not  exempt,  regarded 
their  oath  of  allegiance  with  strict  fidelity.  This  fidelity,  in- 
deed, they  considered  due  to  the  imperator  himself  rather 
than  to  the  senate  and  people,  whom  they  equally  despised : 
they  were  satisfied  with  the  power  of  making  the  Caesars, 
and  as  yet  were  far  from  conceiving  in  their  minds  the  idea 
of  unmaking  them  again. 

But  far  different  was  the  case  with  the  legions  in  the  prov- 
inces. The  legionary  was  still  less  Roman  than  the  praeto- 
rian. If  to  a great  extent  the  recruits  for  the 

The  legions  re-  - ° . 

muted  in  the  frontier  camps  were  still  levied  from  the  class 
which  possessed  the  nominal  franchise  of  the  city, 
yet  these  citizens  were  themselves,  for  the  most  part,  new-en- 
franchised provincials : they  had  received  Latin  or  Roman 
rights  as  a boon  from  the  emperor,  or  perhaps  purchased 
them  for  the  sake  of  their  fiscal  immunities.  Romans  in  blood 
or  even  Italians  the  legionaries  no  longer  were.  They  were 
supported  by  ample  levies  of  auxiliaries,  avowedly  of  foreign 
extraction,  generally  transferred  from  their  homes  to  a camp 
at  a far  distant  station  ; Silures  and  Brigantes  to  the  Danube ; 
Tungri  and  Suevi  to  the  borders  of  Wales  ; Iberians  to  the 
Euphrates,  Numidians  to  the  Rhine.  Amidst  the  clang  of 
dissonant  languages  that  resounded  through  the  camp  the 
Latin  was  the  least  heard  and  understood.3  Yet  the  word  of 

1 Suet.  Tib.  36.,  Claud.  10.,  Ner,  10. ; Tac.  Ann.  xv.  72. 

2 The  military  inscriptions,  such  as  those  on  the  Roman  walls  in  the  north 
of  Britain,  from  which  chiefly  these  facts  are  elicited,  are  generally  of  a later 
date  than  that  we  are  now  considering.  To  this  subject  I shall  have  occasion 

to  revert  hereafter. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


259 


command  was  still  Roman,  and  the  chief  officers  were  Ro- 
mans also:  the  affections  of  this  soldiery,  long  estranged 
from  the  emperor  and  the  senate,  were  attached  to  the  tri- 
bune and  the  legatus : and  the  murmurs  of  the  nobles  at 
home,  which  moved  the  sympathy  of  their  kinsmen  on  the 
frontier,  met  a deep  response  in  the  devotion  of  these  sons  of 
the  eagles  to  their  accustomed  leaders.  The  vast  distance  of 
the  great  camps  of  the  empire  from  one  another,  and  the  fre- 
quent change  of  their  officers,  together  with  the  motives  of 
jealousy  which  the  emperors  nourished  between  them,  helped 
to  prevent  these  legions  from  joining  in  a common  cause  when 
disaffection  menaced  an  outbreak  in  any  particular  quarter.1 
They  made  some  partial  attempts  to  supplant  the  praetorians 
by  carrying  one  of  their  own  chiefs  to  power ; but  every  en- 
deavour of  the  kind  had  been  hitherto  baffled  by  the  want  of 
concert  among  them. 

While,  however,  the  emperors  power  was  thus  firmly 
rooted  in  the  capital,  the  blow  which  was  at  last  to  overwhelm 
him  was  slowly  preparing  in  the  provinces.  The 

t _ . i A ....  Independent 

policy  of  the  first  Caesars,  which,  m order  to  re-  position  of  the 
press  popular  excitement  at  the  seat  of  govern-  proconi’als- 
ment,  had  renounced  the  maxim  of  the  free  state,  that  office 
should  be  held  only  for  a limited  term,  had  raised,  in  fret,  a 
number  of  vice-Caesars  to  the  dependent  thrones  of  the  pro- 
vincial governments.  On  the  Rhine,  the  Danube,  and  the 
Euphrates,  and  on  a smaller  scale  at  the  centre  of  each  pro- 
consular jurisdiction,  a Roman  senator,  generally  of  high 
birth  and  hereditary  wealth,  held  the  place  of  the  imperator 
at  the  head  of  the  armies,  and  of  the  whole  civil  and  finan- 
cial establishment.  In  this  arduous  position  his  hands  were 
at  least  unfettered.  He  quitted  Rome  attended  by  friends 
of  his  own  choosing ; neither  prince  nor  senate  interfered 
with  his  appointments.  Xo  council  at  his  seat  of  government, 
under  pretence  of  assisting,  had  the  power  of  controlling  him. 
Throughout  the  extent  of  his  province  the  word  of  the  pro- 

1 Thus  Tacitus  remarks,  ITist,  i.  9. : “ Longis  spatiis  discreti  exercitus,  quod 
saluberrimum  est  ad  contmendam  fidem.’’ 


260 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


consul  was  law.  The  praetor’s  edict  did  not  rnn  "beyond 
Rome  and  Italy.  If  in  ordinary  transactions  between  Ro- 
mans the  body  of  Roman  law  was  held  nominally  in  force, 
the  master  of  the  sword,  so  far  removed  from  all  supervision, 
was  actually  paramount,  and  the  judicial  officers,  under  his 
appointment  and  control,  were  simply  interpreters  of  his  will. 
Without  a senate,  without  a public  opinion,  with  hardly  a 
tradition  of  government  to  check  him,  the  ruler  of  Gaul  and 
Syria  was  really  more  an  emperor  than  the  emperor  himself 
Dismissing  from  his  mind,  as  much  as  possible,  the  thought 
of  Caesar’s  wrath,  as  of  a capricious  Nemesis  which  might 
at  any  moment  be  raised  against  him,  he  enjoyed  the  favours 
of  fortune  to  the  full,  and  compensated  himself  for  the  risks 
of  his  position  by  its  substantial  advantages. 

It  would  be  idle  to  suppose  that  the  independence  of  the 
great  captains  in  the  provinces  would  be  exercised  without  a 
large  amount  of  deliberate  or  wanton  tyranny. 

Their  govern-  ° J ^ 

ment  less  tyr-  But  the  murmurs  of  the  provincials  have  been 

annical  than  A . 

that  of  the  em-  suppressed,  their  complaints  have  been  buried  in 

perors  at  Rome.  n ..  . _ 

oblivion,  lhat  from  time  to  time  a vicious  pro- 
consul  was  still  accused  by  his  subjects  and  condemned  by 
an  equitable  emperor,  we  learn  from  a few  incidental  notices : 
more  than  once  a corner  of  the  veil  is  raised,  and  we  read,  as 
in  Palestine  especially,  of  their  violence  and  cruelty : never- 
theless, on  the  whole,  the  balance  of  testimony  seems  to  show 
that  the  provinces  were  governed  more  mildly  than  could 
have  been  anticipated,  more  mildly  than  the  capital  itself. 
The  reason  seems  to  be  this,  that  while  the  excesses  of  the 
emperors  at  Rome  were  generally  caused  by  personal  fear, 
and  often  designed  to  stifle  the  first  murmurs  of  discontent, 
in  the  provinces  the  governors  had  no  such  enemies  to  appre- 
hend, while  no  severity  towards  their  dependents  could  pro- 
tect them  against  their  only  enemy,  the  emperor  himself. 
The  proconsuls,  moreover,  were  always  men  of  high  character 
and  standing,  experienced  in  government,  trained  by  disci- 
pline and  accustomed  to  self-control ; they  were  not  mere 
striplings  elevated  by  court  favour,  without  preparation  for 


A.  U.  819.] 


USDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


261 


their  arduous  employment,  without  habits  either  of  obedi- 
ence or  command-  The  history  of  the  world  presents  us, 
perhaps,  with  no  such  succession  of  able  captains  and  admin- 
istrators, as  the  long  series  of  the  governors  of  Syria  or 
Macedonia : we  can  only  regret  that  our  acquaintance  with 
them  is  so  imperfect,  that  the  lines  of  their  policy  are  often 
to  be  traced  for  the  most  part  by  conjecture  and  inference. 
Above  all,  however,  it  may  be  remarked  that  loyalty  to  the 
commonwealth  was  still  the  leading  idea  in  the  mind  of  the 
proconsul : he  regarded  himself  strictly  as  the  instrument  of 
her  behests  ; he  acted  with  a single  eye  to  her  interest,  bar- 
ring only  a certain  amount  of  licensed  profit  for  himself; 
while,  as  the  sworn  lieutenant  of  the  imperator  at  home,  he 
considered  the  commonwealth  as  centred  in  the  imperial 
person. 

By  careful  examination  of  the  authorities,  it  has  been 
found  possible  to  make  a complete  list  of  the  governors  of 
the  great  province  of  Syria,  the  importance  of  which  in  Ro- 
man history  has  been  so  often  indicated.1  After  the  death 
of  Germanicus  in  772,  his  officers,  while  awaiting 

. . - nvi  • 1 • « r List  of  the  pro- 

the  pleasure  ot  libenus,  desired  bentius  baturrn-  consuls  of  Sy- 

nus  to  act  as  legatus  of  the  imperator.  This  of 

1 See  the  elaborate  and  interesting  dissertation  of  Aug.  Zumpt  ( Comm, . 


Epigraph,  ii.  73-150.). 

I give  here  his  list  of  proconsuls,  with  their  dates : — 

B.  c. 

A.  IT. 

A.  D. 

a.  r. 

Q.  Didius  - 

- 30 

724  1 

P.  Sulpicius  Quirinius 

- 6 

759 

M.  Messala  Corvinus 

29 

725 

Q.  Caecilius  Silanus 

11 

764 

M.  Tullius  Cicero 

- 28 

726 

Cn.  Calpumius  Piso  - 

- 17 

770 

A.  Terentius  Murena 

28 

726 

L.  iElius  Lamia 

21 

774 

C.  Sentius  Satuminus  - 

- 26 

728 

L.  Pomponius  Flaccus 

- 32 

785 

M.  Agrippa  - 

23 

731 

L.  Vitellius  - 

35 

788 

M.  Titius  - 

- 13 

741 

P.  Petronius 

- 39 

792 

C.  Sentius  Satuminus 

9 

745 

C.  Yibius  Marsus  - 

42 

795 

P.  Quintilius  Varus  - 

6 

748 

C.  Cassius  Longinus  - 

- 45 

798 

P.  Sulpicius  Quirinius 

4 

750 

C.  Ummidius  Quadratus  - 

60 

803 

M.  Lollius  - 

- 1 

753 

Domitius  Corbulo 

- 61 

814 

A.  D. 

C.  Cestius  Gallus  - 

63 

816 

C.  Marcius  Censorinus 

3 

756 

C.  Licinius  Mucianus  - 

- 66 

819 

L.  Volusius  Satuminus 

- 4 

757 

262 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  66. 


course  did  not  constitute  an  appointment  to  the  proconsul- 
ship which  Piso  had  vacated,  nor  do  we  hear  that  Tiberius 
regarded  it  as  a recommendation.  But  he  was  unwilling  per- 
haps to  offend  a powerful  soldiery  by  openly  repudiating 
their  choice,  or  he  shrank  from  conferring  upon  any  one  the 
full  powers  of  the  Syrian  prefecture.  Accordingly  the  next 
governor,  ^Elius  Lamia,  seems  to  have  been  retained  at  home, 
while  the  province  was  administered  for  several  years  by  the 
chiefs  of  the  four  legions  quartered  within  it.  Lamia  was 
succeeded  by  Pomponius  Flaccus,  who  once  more  united  the 
province  under  a single  ruler,  and  died  in  the  year  786.  IJpon 
this  vacancy  the  carelessness,  or  more  probably  the  jealousy, 
of  the  emperor  allowed  the  province  to  remain  for  two  years 
without  a superior  governor.  Tiberius  pretended  indeed 
that  no  senator  of  sufficient  authority  would  quit  the  dissipa- 
tions of  the  capital  for  the  vice-regal  splendours  of  the  East.1 
The  excuse  was  too  transparent  to  impose  on  any  one.  But 
the  urgency  of  affairs  on  the  oft-disturbed  frontier  compelled 
him  at  last  to  supply  the  vacancy,  and  L.  Yitellius,  to  whom 
Syria  was  assigned  in  788,  seems  to  have  been  one  of  the 
ablest  as  well  as  the  noblest  of  the  senatorial  order.  This 
proconsul  continued  to  govern  through  the  earlier  years  of 
Caius,  till  he  gave  offence  by  hesitating  to  enforce  the  wor- 
ship of  the  emperor  upon  the  Jews.  Certainly  Yitellius,  the 
worshipper  himself  of  Caius,  and  the  devoted  flatterer  of 
Messalina,  had  no  scruples  of  pride  or  religion : but,  good 
soldier  and  administrator  as  lie  was,  he  shrank  from  a wanton 
insult  which  would  infallibly  lead  to  a revolt.2  Petronius, 
who  succeeded  him,  allowed  the  affair  to  linger  under  various 
excuses,  and  the  last  letter,  requiring  him  to  proceed  in  its 
execution  without  further  delay,  reached  him  fortunately  at 
the  same  moment  with  the  news  of  the  emperor’s  death. 
Petronius  was  apparently  an  old  familiar  of  Claudius,  and 
was  permitted  to  retain  the  government  for  some  years  under 

1 Tac.  Ann.  vi.  27. ; Zumpt,  p.  135. 

3 Tacitus  says  of  him,  vi.  32. : “ Regendis  provinces  prisca  virtute  egisse.” 
For  liis  recall  by  Caius,  see  Joseph.  Antiq.  xviii.  8.  2.  a.  u.  793. 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


263 


the  new  Caesar.1  He  was  followed  by  Yibius  Marsus,  one  of 
the  few  friends  of  Germanicus  who  had  preserved,  after  his 
patron’s  death,  the  favour  of  Tiberius,  and  had  been  suffered 
to  pass  three  years  in  the  government  of  Africa.3  The  next 
in  succession,  C.  Cassius  Longinus,  is  a splendid  example  of 
the  character  and  position  which  were  held  to  qualify  for  this 
exalted  sovereignty.  This  man  was  descended  from  the 
family  of  the  Liberator,  who  was  hardly  less  distinguished 
for  his  victories  over  the  Parthians  than  for  his  defence  of  Ro- 
man freedom.  He  had  obtained  the  consulship  under  Tibe- 
rius, but  his  renown  as  the  chief  of  a sect  among  the  jurists 
of  his  age  recommended  him,  under  Claudius,  to  the  still 
higher  honours  of  the  proconsulate.  For  five  years  Syria 
was  ruled  by  Cassius  : after  his  retirement  from  the  province 
he  lost  his  sight,  but  his  reputation  sufficed  of  itself  to  excite 
the  jealousy  of  Hero,  who  banished  him  to  Sardinia  in  the 
year  81 8. 3 From  803  to  814  the  government  was  held  by 
Ummidius  Quadratus,  the  first  of  the  series  of  Syrian  pro- 
consuls  that  died  in  office.  He  owed  his  long  tenure  to  the 
fact  that  Anteius,  designed  by  Hero  for  his  successor,  was  an 
object  of  suspicion  at  court  as  a friend  of  Agrippina.4 

During  the  last  two  proconsulates  the  prefecture  of  Syria 
had  acquired  its  greatest  extension.  On  the  death  of  Herod 
Agrippa  in  797,  his  kingdom  of  Judea  had  been  definitively 
annexed  to  the  empire,  and  was  subjected,  as  once  Annexation  of 
before,  to  an  imperial  procurator,  who,  while  he  If6 

derived  his  fiscal  and  civil  authority  directly  from  Syria- 
the  emperor,  and  acted  in  a manner  as  his  viceroy,  was  never- 
theless placed  under  the  military  control  of  the  proconsul.5 

1 This  Petronius,  called  Publius  by  Josephus  and  Philo,  seems  to  be  the 
same  described  by  Seneca  in  his  satire  on  the  death  of  Claudius,  as  “ vetus 
convictor  ejus,”  and  “ homo  Claudiana  lingua  disertus.”  He  must  have  held 
the  government  of  Syria  till  742.  Zumpt,  p.  136.,  from  Eckhel,  iii.  280. 

2 Eckhel,  iv.  147.,  in  Zumpt,  1.  c. 

3 Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  7. : Suet.  Ner.  37.  He  was  eventually  recalled  from  exile 
by  Vespasian : Pompon,  de  Orig.  Juris,  in  Dig.  i.  2.  47. 

4 Zumpt  on  Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  22.,  xvi.  14. 

6 Tacitus,  Ann.  xii.  60. : “ Ssepius  audita  vox  principis  (Claudii),  parem  vim 


264 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  66. 


Under  court  protection  some  of  the  Judean  procurators,  es- 
pecially the  infamous  Felix,  the  brother  of  Pallas,  and  his 
partner  in  the  favour  of  Claudius,  had  indulged  in  every  ex- 
cess, till  the  spirit  of  revolt  already  roused  by  the  threats  of 
Caius  broke  out  in  fierce  but  desultory  acts  of  violence.  These 
indeed  had  been  repressed  with  the  sternness  of  Rome,  not 
unmingled  with  some  features  of  barbarity  peculiar  to  the 
East.1  Nevertheless  the  government  had  resented  the  tyran- 
ny of  its  officers,  which  had  caused  this  dangerous  insubor- 
dination, and  Quadratus  had  himself  condemned  from  his 
tribunal  the  indiscretion  of  the  procurator  Cumanus.2  While, 
however,  the  authority  of  the  Syrian  proconsul  was  thus  ex- 
tended over  the  region  of  Palestine  in  the  south,  a portion 
of  his  northern  dependencies  was  taken  from  him,  and  erect- 
ed for  a time  into  a separate  prefecture.  In  the  year  808  the 
brave  Domitius  Corbulo,  recalled  from  his  German  com- 
mand, was  deputed  to  maintain  the  majesty  of  the  empire  in 
the  face  of  the  Parthians,  and  defend  Armenia  from  the  in- 
trigues or  violence  with  which  they  continued  to  menace  it. 
The  forces  of  Rome  in  the  East  were  now  divided  between 
Quadratus  and  Corbulo.  To  the  proconsul  of  Syria  were 
left  two  legions  with  their  auxiliaries,  to  the  new  commander 
were  assigned  the  other  two,  while  the  frontier  tributaries  were 
ordered  to  serve  in  either  camp,  as  the  policy  of  the  empire 
should  require.3  While  such  was  the  distribution  of  the 

rerum  habendam  a procuratoribus  suis  judicatarum  ac  si  ipse  statuisset.”  The 
powers  of  the  procurator  were  thus  extended  from  matters  of  revenue  to  jus- 
tice and  administration.  He  was  checked,  however,  by  the  presence  of  a lega- 
tus  with  an  armed  force,  representing  the  proconsul,  in  his  district.  The  gen- 
eral character  of  the  Judean  procurators  is  described  from  a single  instance  by 
Tacitus,  Hist.  v.  9. : “ Claudius,  defunctis  regibus  aut  ad  modicum  redactis, 
Judaeam  provinciam  equitibus  Rom.  aut  libertis  permisit,  e quibus  Antonius 
Felix  per  omnem  saevitiam  ac  libidinem  jus  regium  servili  ingenio  exercuit.” 

1 The  horrid  death  by  crucifixion,  which  in  the  West  was  the  punishment 
of  slaves  only,  was  inflicted  without  scruple  on  the  rebellious  Jews. 

2 Joseph.  Antiq.  Jud.  xx.  6.  3.;  Tac.  Ann.  xiL  54.,  from  which  passage  it 
appears  that  the  proconsul  of  Syria  was  supreme  over  the  imperial  procurator 
in  Judea. 

3 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  8. : “ Domitium  Corbulonem  retinendae  Armeniae  praspo- 


A.  U.  819.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


265 


troops,  the  territory  itself  was  divided  by  the  line  of  the 
Taurus : Cappadocia,  together  with  Galatia,  was  intrusted  to 
Corbulo,  and  constituted  a separate  province.  Campai<rng  of 
Here  he  raised  the  levies  he  required  to  replace  Corbul°- 
the  lazy  veterans  who  had  vitiated  the  Syrian  legions  ; and 
here,  having  further  strengthened  himself  from  the  German 
camps,  this  stern  reviver  of  discipline  prepared  his  men, 
amidst  the  rocks  and  snows,  to  penetrate  the  fastnesses  of 
Armenia,  and  dislodge  the  Parthians  from  the  gorges  of  Ara- 
rat and  Elbrouz.1  Tiridates,  the  Parthian  pretender  to  the 
throne  of  Armenia,  in  vain  opposed  him  with  arms  and 
treachery.  The  Romans  advanced  to  the  walls  of  Artaxata, 
which  they  stormed  and  burnt ; an  exploit,  the  glory  of 
which  was  usurped  by  Hero  himself,  the  senate  voting  sup- 
plications in  his  honour,  and  consecrating  day  after  day  to 
the  celebration  of  his  victory,  till  Cassius  ventured  to  demand 
a limit  to  such  ruinous  profusion.5  The  war  how-  ^ 

ever  was  still  prolonged  through  a second  and  a 811- 

third  campaign : the  Hyrcanians  on  the  banks  of  the  Caspian 
and  Aral, — so  far-reaching  was  the  machinery  put  in  motion 
by  Corbulo, — were  encouraged  to  divert  the  Parthians  from 
assisting  Tiridates;  and  communications  were  held  with 
them  by  the  route  of  the  Red  Sea  and  the  deserts  of  Be- 
loochistan.  At  last  the  Armenian  Tigranes,  long  retained  in 
custody  at  Rome,  was  placed  by  the  proconsul  on  the  throne 
of  his  ancesters.3  Some  portions  of  his  patrimony,  however, 
were  now  attached  to  the  sovereignties  of  Pontus  and  Cap- 
padocia ; a Roman  force  was  left  in  garrison  at  Tigranocerta, 

suerat  . . . Copiae  Oriantis  ita  dividuntur  . . . Socii  reges,  prout  bello  con- 
duceret,  parere  jussi : sed  studia  eorum  in  Corbulonem  promptiora  erant.” 

1 The  rigours  of  winter  in  this  elevated  and  inclement  region,  the  land  of 
Kars  and  Erzeroum,  which  have  acquired  such  notoriety  in  our  own  day,  are 
painted  with  terrible  force  by  Tacitus.  Ann.  xiii.  35. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xiii.  41.:  “C.  Cassius  . . . disseruit  . . . oportere  dividi  sa- 
cros  et  negotiosos  dies,  queis  divina  colerent  et  humana  non  impedirent.” 

Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  25,  26. : “ Pars  Armenise,  ut  cuique  finitima,  Pharasmania 
Polemonique,  et  Aristobulo  atquei  Antiocho,  parere  jussae.” 


266 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  60. 


to  support  his  precarious  power ; and  on  the  death  of  Qua- 
dratus,  Corbulo,  having  achieved  the  most  brilliant  successes 
in  the  East  of  any  Roman  since  Pompeius,  claimed  the  whole 
province  of  Syria,  and  the  entire  administration  of  affairs  on 
the  Parthian  frontier,  as  his  legitimate  reward.1 

The  union  of  these  wide  regions  once  more  under  a single 
ruler,  so  contrary,  as  it  would  appear,  to  the  emperor’s  nat- 
The  position  of  ura^  policy,  was  extorted  perhaps  from  the  fears 
Sme^fomida-  ^er°5  not  indeed  by  actual  threats,  but  by  the 
bie  to  Nero.  formidable  attitude  of  his  general.  An  emperor, 
still  a youth,  who  had  seen  no  service  himself,  and  had  only 
caught  at  the  shadows  of  military  renown  cast  on  him  by  his 
lieutenants,  may  have  felt  misgivings  at  the  greatness  of  the 
real  chiefs  of  his  legions.  It  was  from  this  jealousy,  perhaps, 
that  the  career  of  conquest  in  Britain  was  so  suddenly  check- 
ed after  the  victory  of  Suetonius.  The  position  indeed  of 
Corbulo,  the  successor  of  Agrippa  and  Germanicus,  might 
seem  beyond  the  emperor’s  reach.  It  could  only  be  balanced 
by  creating  similar  positions  in  other  quarters,  and  the  empire 
was,  in  fact,  at  this  moment  virtually  divided  among  three 
or  four  great  commanders,  any  one  of  whom  was  leader  of 
more  numerous  forces  than  could  be  mustered  to  oppose  him 
at  the  seat  of  government.  Nero  was  well  aware  of  his  dan- 
ger ; but  he  had  not  the  courage  to  insist,  on  this  occasion, 
on  the  division  of  Syria  into  two  prefectures.  He  took,  as 
we  shall  see,  a baser  precaution,  and  already  perhaps  contem- 
plated the  assassination  of  the  lieutenant  whom  he  dared  not 
control.  It  was  from  Corbulo  himself  that  the  proposal  came 
for  at  least  a temporary  division.  That  gallant  general,  a 
man  of  antique  devotion  to  military  principles,  had  no  views 
of  personal  aggrandisement.  When  the  Parthians,  again 
collecting  their  forces,  made  a simultaneous  attack  on  both 
Armenia  and  Syria,  Corbulo  declared  that  the  double  war 
required  the  presence  of  two  chiefs  of  equal  authority.  He 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xiv.  26. : “ Corbulo  in  Syrian  abcessit,  morte  Ummidii  legati 
vacuam  et  sibi  permissam.” 


A.  U.  813.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


267 


desired  that  the  province  beyond  the  Taurus  should  again  be 
made  a separate  government.1  Assuming  in  per-  A D 62 

son  the  defence  of  the  Syrian  frontier  with  three  A- v-  815- 

legions,  he  transferred  Cappadocia  and  Galatia,  with  an  equal 
force,  to  Csesennius  Psetus,  who  repaid  his  generosity  by  re- 
flecting on  the  presumed  slowness  of  his  operations.2  But 
Psetus  was  as  incapable  as  he  was  vain.  Having  advanced  into 
Armenia,  he  was  shut  up  in  one  of  its  cities  with  two  legions, 
by  a superior  force,  constrained  to  implore  aid  from  Corbulo, 
and  at  last,  when  the  distance  and  difficulty  of  the  way  pre- 
cluded the  possibility  of  succour,  to  capitulate  ignominiously. 
Yologesus,  king  of  Parthia,  refrained  from  proceeding  to  ex- 
tremities, and  treating  the  humbled  foe  as  his  ancestor  had 
treated  Crassus.8  He  pretended  to  desire  only  a fair  arrange- 
ment of  the  points  in  dispute  between  the  rival  empires  ; and 
Psetus,  having  promised  that  pending  this  settlement  the 
legions  should  be  withdrawn  from  Armenia,  was  suffered, 
though  not  without  previous  indignities,  to  march  out  of  his 
captured  stronghold,  and  retire  in  haste  within  the  frontiers.4 
Arrived  there,  Corbulo  treated  him  with  scornful  forbearance  ; 
but  the  emperor  recalled  him  from  his  ppst,  and  the  combined 
forces  of  the  province  were  once  more  entrusted  toi  the  only 
man  capable  of  retrieving  the  disaster.6  Corbulo  penetrated 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  3.  6. 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  6. : “ Psetus despiciebat  gesta,  nihil  csedis  aut 

prsedse dictitans.”  But  Tacitus  himself  had  said  of  Corbulo,  “ bellum 

habere  quam  gerere  malebat.” 

3 A terrible  rumour  reached  Rome  that  the  legions  had  been  made  to  pass 
under  the  yoke.  Tac.  Ann.  xy.  15.  Suetonius  speaks  of  it  as  a fact,  I have  no 
doubt  erroneously.  JVer.  39. 

4 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  16—18.  The  triumphal  arch,  already  decreed  during  the 
progress  of  these  events  to  Nero,  was  completed  and  dedicated  in  the  face  of 
this  military  disaster. 

6 The  civil  command  in  Syria  was  now  committed  to  Cincius  or  Cestius  Gal- 
lus  (Zumpt,  p.  141.),  but  the  combined  forces  of  the  Eastern  provinces  were 
placed  under  Corbulo,  and  he  received  authority,  like  that  given  to  Pompeius  by 
the  Gabinian  law,  over  all  officers,  civil  and  military,  throughout  the  East. 
Thus  we  find  that  he  summoned  to  his  standard  cohorts  from  Hlyricum  and 
Egypt.  Tac.  Ann.  xv.  25,  26. 


268 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


into  the  heart  of  Armenia  by  the  road  which  Lucullus  had 
formerly  opened ; but  the  enemy  declined  to  encounter  him. 
Even  on  the  spot  of  his  ally’s  recent  triumphs,  Tiridates  bow- 
ed to  the  demands  of  the  proconsul,  and  consented  to  lay  his 
diadem  at  the  feet  of  the  emperor’s  image,  and  go  to  Rome 
to  receive  it  back  from  his  hand.1 2  The  claims  of  the  puppet 
Tigranes  were  eventually  set  aside,  and  while  Tiridates  did 
homage  for  his  kingdom  to  Nero,  he  was  suffered  to  place 
himself  really  under  the  protection  of  Yologesus. 

In  the  year  816  (a.  d.  63),  the  period  of  these  transactions, 
Kero,  we  are  told,  was  preparing  to  visit  the  East  in  person. 
„ Some  indeed  asserted  that  his  object  was  only  to 

Probable  object  J J 

of  Nero’s  pro-  behold  the  wonders  of  Egypt : and  the  interest 

posed  visit  to  . . . ° r 7 

the  East.  of  the  citizens  was  just  then  directed  towards 
a.  d.  63.  that  mysterious  region  by  the  discoveries  of  an 
exploring  party,  which  had  recently  ascended 
the  Kile  900  miles  above  Syene.3  Others  believed  that  he 
had  no  intention  of  proceeding  beyond  Greece ; but  it  seems 
probable  that  his  views  were  really  more  extensive,  and  that 
he  contemplated  throwing  himself  into  the  quarters  of  the 
Syrian  legions,  and  checking  by  his  presence  the  ambition  of 
the  proconsul,  perhaps  seizing  an  opportunity  to  overthrow 
him.  But,  whatever  Kero’s  project  may  have  been,  it  was 
frustrated  as  we  have  seen,  by  the  occurrence  of  the  fire  at 
Rome.  The  affairs  of  the  next  three  years  have  been  already 

1 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  29,  30. : “ At  nunc  versos  casus : iturum  Tiridatem  ostentui 
gentibus,  quanto  minus  quam  captivum  ! ” 

2 Tac.  Ann.  xv.  36. : “ Omissa  in  prsesens  Achaia, provincias 

Orientis,  maxime  iEgyptum,  secretis  imaginationibus  agitans.” 

3 For  a brief  notice  of  this  interesting  expedition,  see  Pliny,  Hist.  Nat.  vi. 
35.,  also  Seneca,  Nat  Qucest.  vi.  8.,  who  had  conversed  with  some  of  the  party. 
The  curiosity  of  the  Romans  is  reflected  in  the  long  episode  about  the  Nile  in 
the  tenth  book  of  Lucan’s  Fharsalia,  where  the  previous  attempts  to  reach  its 
source  are  enumerated : 

“ Quae  tibi  noscendi  Nilum,  Romane,  cupido  est, 

Et  Phariis  Persisque  fuit,  Macetumque  tyrannis : 

Nullaque  non  aetas  voluit  conferre  futuris 
Notitiam ; sed  vincit  adhuc  natura  latendi,”  &c. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


269 


related : the  conspiracies  which  were  concerted  against  the 
emperor  at  home,  his  redoubled  efforts  to  secure  the  favour 
of  the  populace,  and  his  cruel  precaution  of  destroying  every 
man  of  eminence  who  might  become  the  centre  of  fresh 
machinations  to  his  prejudice.  In  the  year  819,  66 

he  at  last  found  leisure  to  execute  his  scheme  of  A- v- 819- 
travel,  so  far,  at  least,  as  to  visit  Greece ; where  he  presented 
himself  at  the  public  spectacles,  and  gratified  his  passion  for 
dancing  and  singing,  before  promiscuous  assemblages,  with 
still  less  reserve  than  at  home.  All  the  states  which  held 
musical  contests  had  hastened,  even  before  his  arrival,  to 
humour  him  with  the  offer  of  their  prizes,  and  Nero  had  re- 
ceived their  envoys  with  the  highest  honours,  and  invited 
them  to  his  table.  When  one  of  them  begged  him  to  give 
a specimen  of  his  singing,  and  his  skill  was  rapturously  ap- 
plauded, he  declared  that  the  Greeks  alone  had  ears,  and 
alone  deserved  the  honour  of  hearing  him.1 

Nero  remained  in  Greece  to  the  beginning  of  the  year 
821.  He  was  attended  by  courtiers  and  court-followers  of  all 
descriptions,  and  many,  it  was  affirmed,  of  the 

_ . „ r , ...  . . , ,.  NeroinGreece: 

chief  nobility  were  invited  to  accompany  him,  his  triumphs  at 

, , -ill  -f  J the  Grecian 

that  he  might  slay  them  more  securely  at  a dis-  games, 
tance  from  the  city.  However  this  may  be,  the  a.d.  67. 
ministers  of  his  luxury  and  panders  to  his  vices  ‘A*T7‘ 
formed  the  most  conspicuous  portion  of  his  escort ; for  he 
seems  to  have  prosecuted  his  enormities  among  the  despised 
Greeks  more  shamelessly  than  ever.2  The  great  ambition 
of  the  Imperator,  now  following  in  the  track  of  Mummius, 
Flamininus,  Agrippa,  and  Augustus,  was  to  gain  the  distinc- 
tion of  a Periodonicus,  or  victor  in  the  whole  circle  of  the 

1 Suet.  Ner.  22. 

2 This  absence  from  Rome  may,  indeed,  have  allowed  greater  licence  to  ex- 
aggeration in  our  accounts ; but  generally  the  Romans  indulged  their  vices 
more  freely  abroad.  As  regards  the  nuptials  of  Nero  with  Sporus  under  the 
name  of  Sabina,  it  may  be  worth  while  to  observe  that  it  was  in  Greece,  not  in 
Rome,  that  they  were  solemnized.  Dion,  lxiii.  13.  Nevertheless,  the  story  of 
Nero  and  Pythagoras  in  Tacitus  {Ann.  xv.  37.)  admits  of  no  such  qualification. 


270 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  67. 


Games ; for  in  compliment  to  him,  the  contests  which  re- 
curred in  successive  years  at  Olympia,  Nemea,  Delphi,  and 
Corinth  were  all  to  be  enacted  during  his  residence  in  the 
country.1  Nor  was  this  the  only  irregularity  admitted.  At 
Olympia  he  demanded  a musical  contest,  such  as  had  never 
been  practised  there  before ; at  the  Isthmus  he  contended  in 
tragedy  and  comedy,  which  also  was  contrary  to  the  local 
usage.2 3  The  exertions  of  Nero  were  not  confined  to  play- 
ing, singing,  and  acting.  He  presented  himself  also  as  a 
charioteer,  nor  was  he  ashamed  to  receive  the  prize  even 
when  he  had  fallen  with  car  and  horses  to  the  ground. 
Wherever  he  went  he  challenged  the  most  famous  artists  to 
contend  with  him,  and  extorted  every  prize  from  every  com- 
petitor. A Roman  consular  enacted  the  part  of  herald,  and 
proclaimed  in  the  astonished  ears  of  Greece,  Nero  the  Empe- 
ror is  Victor , and  he  crowns  the  People  of  Rome , and  the 
World  which  is  his  own.2 

The  flattery  of  the  Greeks  deserved  substantial  acknowl- 
edgment, and  Nerd  was  prepared  to  make  a sacrifice  for  the 
purpose.  He  negotiated  an  exchange  of  provinces  with  the 
senate,  resigning  the  imperial  prison-house  of  Sardinia,  and 
receiving  in  its  place  the  prefecture  of  Achaia. 

Nero  proclaims  ° A A . 

the  freedom  of  He  then  proclaimed,  in  the  forum  at  Corinth,  the 
freedom  and  immunity  of  the  province,  while  he 
awarded  to  his  judges  the  honour  of  Roman  citizenship,  to- 
gether with  large  presents  in  money.4  Another  project 


1 Suet.  Ner.  23. ; Dion,  lxiii.  10.,  where  see  Reimar’s  note.  This  Olympiad 
of  confusion  was  afterwards  omitted  from  the  list  in  consequence.  Philostr. 
Vit.  Apoll.  iv.  24.  Pausan.  x.  36. 

2 Lucian,  Ner.  9. 

3 Dion,  lxiii.  14. : oretyavol  t6v  re  tcjv  *P ufiaiuv  dijpov  Kal  rrjv  Idiav  o'ucov- 

flEVTJV. 

4 Plutarch,  Flamin .,  12.,  who  might  have  been  a witness  . . . Nepov  naff 
ijpag  kv  K opivdu  . . . says  that  he  made  this  announcement  from  the  rostrum 
in  the  agora.  Suetonius,  Ner.  24.,  with  the  zeal  of  the  historians  to  blacken 
Nero’s  character  as  a Roman,  declares  that  he  spoke  from  the  stadium  itself. 
“ Quse  beneficia  e medio  stadio,  Isthmiorum  die,  sua  ipse  voce  pronuntiavit.” 
Dion,  lxiii.  11.,  does  not  mention  the  place. 


A.  U.  820.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


271 


ascribed  to  him,  magnificent  and  useful  in  itself,  may  have 
had  no  other  object  in  his  mind  than  to  render  him  famous 
in  history  ; in  almost  any  other  human  being  we  should  look 
for  some  worthier  motive  for  it.  This  was  the 

• _ . His  project  for 

cutting  of  the  Isthmus  oi  Corinth,  a measure  cutting  through 
. , _ i , , the  Isthmus, 

often  before  proposed  and  attempted,  but  never 

achieved.1  The  work  was  commenced : convicts  were  con- 
demned to  labour  upon  it,  and  among  them  the  learned  Stoic 
Musonius  Rufus,  removed  from  Gyarus,  whither  he  had  been 
banished  as  an  accomplice  in  Piso’s  conspiracy,  was  seen  by 
another  philosopher  handling  the  spade  and  pick-axe.  But 
men  of  science  from  Egypt  assured  the  emperor  that,  if  the 
work  were  effected,  the  waters  of  the  Corinthian  gulf,  being 
higher  than  the  Saronic,  would  submerge  the  island  of  A£gina, 
and  after  Nero’s  departure  the  design  was  promptly  aban- 
doned.2 The  Romans  regarded  its  frustration  as  a judgment 
perhaps  on  his  unnatural  pride.  In  commencing  the  work 
with  a sacrifice,  it  had  been  remarked,  as  an  instance  of  the 
hatred  he  bore  the  senate,  that  he  had  prayed  simply  that  it 
might  turn  out  well  for  the  Emperor  and  the  People  of 
Pome.3 

It  is  not  impossible,  however,  that  there  may  have  b$en  a 
politic  motive  in  this  visit  to  Greece,  such  as  I have  for- 
merly suggested  for  the  expedition  of  Caius  into 

^ it  n • A political  mo- 

Gaul.  bresh  disturbances  had  broken  out  m tivemaybe 
Judea:  the  cruelties  of  Gessius  Florus  had  ex-  this&vfsitfto 
cited  a sedition,  which  Cestius  Gallus  advanced 
to  Jerusalem  from  Antioch  to  repress.  But  here  he  had 


1 On  these  futile  attempts  see  Pliny,  Hist.  Nat  iv.  4.  Lucan  also  alludes  to 
this  as  one  of  the  common  visions  of  ambition  and  enterprise.  Phars.  vi.  60. : 

“ Tot  potuere  manus  adjungere  Seston  Abydo,  .... 

Et  ratibus  longse  flexus  donare  Maleae.” 

2 Suet.  Ner.  19. ; Dion,  lxiii.  16. ; Philostr.  Vil.  Apolt.  iv.  24.,  v.  19.  I 
believe  there  is  no  foundation  for  the  idea  of  the  one  sea  being  higher  than  the 
other.  A similar  notion  respecting  the  Red  Sea  and  the  Mediterranean  has 
prevailed  to  much  later  times.  The  late  French  Survey  (1853)  makes,  I am 
told,  the  former  one  metre  higher  than  the  latter. 

3 Suet.  Ner.  37. : “ Dissimulata  senatus  mentione.” 


272 


HISTORV  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  67. 


encountered  the  people  in  arms,  and  had  been  suddenly- 
overpowered  and  slain.  The  Jews  were  elated  with  success 
and  hopeless  of  pardon ; it  was  soon  evident  that  the  great 
war  which  must  decide  the  fate  of  their  country,  and  with  it 
of  the  Roman  empire  of  the  East,  so  often  threatened,  so 
long  delayed,  had  commenced.  But  Corbulo  was  almost  on 
the  spot ; his  legions  were  mighty,  his  name  still  mightier ; 
such  forces  under  such  a leader  might  be  trusted  to  do  the 
work  of  Rome  thoroughly  in  any  quarter.  Nevertheless  the 
Nero  jealous  of  jealousy  of  the  wretched  prince  prevailed  over 
Corbulo.  . an  concern  for  the  interests  of  his  country.1 2  He 
trembled  at  the  increase  of  influence  this  new  war  might 
bring  to  his  formidable  proconsul.  This  was  the  moment  he 
Summons  him  ch°se  for  repairing  in  person  to  the  threshold  of 
putfhimtond  his  province,  and  summoning  the  man  he  feared 
death.  to  attend  upon  him  in  Greece.  At  the  same  time 

he  ordered  Yespasianus,  who  had  already  distinguished  him- 
self in  the  British  war,  but  had  acquired  as  yet  no  dangerous 
pre-eminence,  to  take  command  of  the  forces  destined  for 
Palestine.  Corbulo  must  have  known  that  he  was  supersed- 
ed : he  must  have  felt  his  summons  as  a disgrace ; he  must 
have  apprehended  personal  danger.  Yet  had  he  known  that 
every  step  he  took  westward  was  bringing  him  straight  to 
his  doom,  such  was  his  fidelity  as  a soldier  that  he  would 
have  obeyed  without  hesitation.  No  sooner  had  he  arrived 
at  Cenchrese,  the  port  of  Corinth,  than  he  was  met  by  emis- 
saries from  Nero  bearing  him  the  order  to  dispatch  himself. 
Without  murmur  or  remonstrance,  he  plunged  a sword  into 
his  heart,  exclaiming  as  he  struck  the  blow,  Rightly  served /* 

1 The  remark  of  Tiridates  to  Nero  at  Rome,  “ What  a good  slave  you  have 
in  Corbulo,”  Dion,  lxiii.  6.,  was  meant,  I suppose,  to  excite  his  apprehensions 
of  a man  who  with  such  power  condescended  to  servitude. 

2 Dion,  lxiii.  17. : iraiov  eX eyev,  a^ioq.  We  have  now  lost  the  guidance  of 
Tacitus,  and  are  less  certain  of  our  dates.  Dion  places  this  event  in  820,  The 
appointment  of  Vespasian  was  certainly  towards  the  end  of  819  (Joseph.  Bell. 
Jud.  iii.  4.  2.),  and  Zumpt  thinks  that  Corbulo  had  fallen  before  this  appoint- 
ment was  made.  On  the  whole,  I do  not  see  reason  to  reject  the  date  in  Dion. 


A.  U.  820.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


273 


Nor  was  the  gallant  Corbulo  the  tyrant’s  only  victim. 
At  the  same  time  he  summoned  two  brothers,  Rufus  and 
Proculus,  of  the  great  Scribonian  house,  who 

1 ° Assassination 

commanded  m the  two  Germames,  to  meet  him  of  two  other 
in  Greece,  under  pretence  of  conferring  with 
them  on  state  affairs.  The  summons  was  in  fact  a recall,  and 
the  pretence  which  accompanied  it  could  hardly  have  de- 
ceived them  ; yet  they  too  obeyed  with  the  same  alacrity  as 
Corbulo,  and  fell,  perhaps  not  unwittingly,  into  the  same 
snare.  Some  specific  charges  were  laid  against  them ; but 
no  opportunity  was  given  them  of  meeting  them,  nor  were 
they  allowed  to  see  the  emperor.  They  killed  themselves  in 
despair.1 

Although  during  his  sojourn  in  Greece,  Nero  traversed 
the  province  in  every  direction,  it  was  observed  that  he  ab- 
stained from  visiting  either  Athens  or  Sparta. 

. . A Nero  shrinks 

With  respect  to  the  city  of  Lycurgus  it  was  af-  from  present- 

r . -ii  ^ ® . ing  himself  at 

firmed  merely  that  he  kept  aloof  from  it  lest  the  Athens,  and 

. _ . tit  from  initiation 

austerity  of  its  usages  should  prove  irksome  to  into  the  myste- 
him ; but  he  dared  not  enter  the  abode  of  the  nes  at  Eleusis' 
Erinnyes,  from  dread  of  their  vengeance  on  his  crimes.2 
Another  account  said  that  he  refrained  from  initiation  into 
the  mysteries  of  Eleusis,  which  was  denied,  under  direst  im- 
precations, to  the  impious  and  impure.’  Of  these  awful 
legends  of  Grecian  antiquity  but  a faint  and  confused  echo  re- 
sounded in  Italy.  To  the  Latin  or  the  Sabine  it  little  mat- 
tered whether  the  murderer  shrank  from  Athens  or  Eleusis, 
whether  it  was  the  avenging  Furies  or  the  pure  goddess  of 
the  mysteries  before  whom  he  trembled  to  appear.  Give 
but  freedom  to  the  people , they  said,  to  declare  what  they 
really  think , and  who  so  base  as  to  hesitate  between  the  lots  of 
Seneca  and  Nero  / Nero  who  more  than  once  deserved  the 

1 Dion,  1.  c.  2 Dion,  lxiii.  14. 

3 Suet.  JVer.  34.  There  seems  to  be  a confusion  between  the  two  accounts, 
and  that  of  Suetonius  appears  the  more  worthy  of  belief.  The  furies  were  al- 
ready present  to  the  murderer  of  Agrippina  : “ Saepe  confessus  exagitari  se  ma- 
tema  specie,  verberibusque  Furiarum  ac  tsedis  ardentibus.” 

VOL.  vi. — 18 


274 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  67. 


sack,  the  serpent , and  the  ape , the  instruments  of 
Sm  expressed  death  for  parricide.  True , Orestes  by  divine 

by  Juvenal.  command  had  slain  his  mother  / but  he  at  least 
avenged  the  death  of  a father — Nero  had  assisted  at  the 
slaughter  of  Claudius:  Orestes  spared  at  least  his  wife  and 
sister — Nero  had  murdered  both : Orestes  had  not  poisoned  a 
kinsman — Nero  had  mingled  aconite  for  many : above  all , 
Orestes  had  never  sung  upon  the  stage , nor  chanted , like 
Nero , the  fall  of  llion.  This  it  seems  was  the  crown  and 
climax  of  his  crimes,  the  last  and  worst  of  the  indignities  he 
heaped  on  Rome ; this  was  the  deed  for  which  the  sword  of 
the  avenger  was  most  fitly  drawn.1 2  For  such , exclaims  Ju- 
venal, forsooth , were  the  acts , such  were  the  arts  of  our  high- 
born prince,  proud  to  degrade  himself  on  a foreign  stage , 
and  earn  the  paltry  chaplets  of  the  Grecian  games.  Let  him 
lay  before  the  image  of  Domitius  the  mantle  of  Thyestes , the 
mask  of  Antigone  or  Melanippe ; let  him  hang  his  votive 
lyre  on  the  marble  statue  of  Augustus? 

Beneath  this  veil  of  rhetoric  lies  a truth  which  it  is  the 
province  of  history  to  remark.  The  Romans,  from  age  to 

1 Juvenal,  viii.  211.  foil.: 

“ Libera  si  dentur  populo  suflragia,  &c 

Troica  non  scripsit.” 

He  composed  his  tragedy,  T poiac  aXoaie,  before ; he  took  occasion  to  sing  it  at 
the  burning  of  Rome. 

2 Juvenal,  1.  c.  224. : 

“ Haec  opera  atque  has  sunt  generosi  Principis  artes, 

Gaudentis  foedo  peregrina  ad  pulpita  socco 
Prostitui,  Graiaeque  apium  meruisse  coronas. 

Majorum  effigies  habeant  insignia  vocis,  .... 

Et  de  marmoreo  citharam  suspende  colosso.” 

Some  critics  have  been  tempted  to  interpret  the  last  line  of  the  Colossus  of 
Nero  himself,  which  stood  in  the  entrance  of  his  golden  house,  said  to  have 
been  110  or  120  feet  in  height.  Pliny  (Hist.  Hat.  xxxiv.  18.)  gives  us  to  under- 
stand that  this  statue  was  of  marble,  while  such  colossal  figures  were  generally 
cast  in  bronze.  “ Ea  statua  indicavit  interisse  aeris  fundendi  scientiam.”  But 
it  seems  safer  to  refer  it  to  the  statement  of  Suetonius  (Her.  1 2.) : citharam  a 

judicibus  ad  se  delatam  adoravit,  ferrique  ad  Augusti  statuam  jussit.” 


A.  U.  820.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE; 


275 


age,  viewed  their  own  times  in  a very  different  light  from 
that  in  which  they  have  appeared  to  posterity.  The  notion 
of  Juvenal  that  the  acting  and  singing  of  Nero  whytheyre- 
were  in  fact  his  most  flagrant  enormities  was  felt  gfan/singlng 
no  doubt,  even  in  his  o wn  day,  as  a wild  exagger- 
ation  ; nevertheless  it  points  to  the  principle,  then  ties- 
still  in  vigour,  of  the  practical  religion  of  antiquity,  the 
principle  of  faith  in  its  social  traditions.  With  cruelty  and 
oppression  the  Romans  were  so  familiar  that  Nero’s  atrocities 
in  this  respect,  so  harrowing  to  our  feelings,  made  little  im- 
pression upon  them;  but  his  desecration  of  their  national 
manners,  his  abandonment  of  the  mos  majorum , the  usage  of 
his  ancestors,  startled  them  like  impiety  or  sacrilege.  They 
were  not  aware  how  far  they  had  really  drifted  from  the 
habits  of  antiquity,  how  much  of  foreign  poison  they  had 
admitted  into  their  veins.  Theoretically  they  still  held  in 
sanctimonious  horror  the  customs  of  the  stranger ; foreign 
usages  might  be  innocent,  nay,  laudable,  in  their  own  place, 
but  to  introduce  them  into  Rome  was  a monstrous  sin,  a sin, 
not  against  the  gods  in  whom  they  no  longer  believed,  but 
against  the  Nation,  in  which  they  believed  more  intensely 
perhaps  than  ever.  The  State  or  Nation  was  itself  gradually 
assuming  in  their  eyes  the  personality  of  a distinct  divinity, 
in  which  all  other  divinities  were  absorbed:  the  Hellenism 
which  Nero  vaunted  was  apostasy  from  the  goddess  Roma. 

The  Greeks  on  the  other  hand  would  regard,  we  may  sup- 
pose, with  more  indulgence  the  caprices  of  their  imperial 
visitor ; they  were  accustomed  to  flatter,  and  in  Nero  piunder3 
this  instance  there  was  some  excuse  for  flattering  monuments^f 
a humour  so  flattering  to  themselves.  The  mis-  art 
erable  vices  he  paraded  before  them  were  too  like  their  own, 
at  least  in  their  period  of  corruption,  to  elicit  strong  moral 
reprobation.  Nevertheless,  if  we  may  credit  our  accounts, 
he  found  more  effectual  means  of  disgusting  them.  The  im- 
perial tyranny  was  always  pursued,  as  by  its  shadow,  by 
profuse  and  fatal  expenditure.  It  seemed  unable  to  move 
without  the  attendance  of  a crowd  of  harpies,  ever  demand- 


276 


HISTORF  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  67. 


ing  their  prey  with  maw  insatiable.  Every  day  required 
fresh  plunder ; every  day  proscriptions  and  confiscations  re- 
vealed the  prince’s  necessities,  and  if  these  for  a moment 
slackened  for  want  of  victims,  his  hands  were  laid  on  the 
monuments  of  art,  on  every  object  on  wdrich  money  could  be 
raised  throughout  the  devoted  land.  The  temples  as  well  as 
the  dwellings  and  the  forums  of  Greece  were  ransacked  again 
for  the  costliest  and  most  cherished  treasures,  to  be  sold  by 
auction  to  the  highest  bidder,  or  redeemed  at  exorbitant 
prices  by  their  unhappy  owners.  Greece  was  powerless  to 
resist,  and  her  murmurs  were  drowned  in  the  acclamations 
of  the  hired  applauders  ; but  she  felt  her  wrongs  deeply,  and 
the  pretended  boon  of  freedom,  accompanied  by  a precarious 
immunity,  was  regarded  perhaps  as  an  insult  rather  than  a 
favour.1 * * * 

Rome  at  least,  it  might  be  hoped,  would  breathe  again 
during  the  absence  of  her  hateful  tormenter.  But  this,  we 
are  assured,  was  as  far  from  her  as  ever.  Her  condition  had 
become  even  more  miserable.  The  emperor  had  given  the 
government  of  Italy  to  a freedman  named  Helius,  and  this 

minion  exercised  cruelty  and  rapine  at  his  own 

Helius  governs  . _ . . 

Rome  during  caprice,  not  even  deigning  to  ask  the  prince  s 

Hero's  absence.  f 7 _ _ _ 

pleasure  beforehand  on  the  executions  and  con- 
fiscations he  commanded.8  Yet  Helius  was  not  unfaithful  to 
his  master’s  interests.  On  the  first  symptoms  of  danger 
from  discontent  in  the  city  or  the  provinces,  for  such  symp- 
toms began  at  last  to  threaten,  he  urged  him  to  hasten  back 
to  the  seat  of  government,  and  it  was  Hero’s  obstinacy  alone 
that  postponed  his  return  for  some  months.  You  admonish 
me , you  entreat  me , replied  the  infatuated  wretch,  to  present 
myself  again  at  Rome  ; nay , but  you  should  rather  dissuade 
me  from  returning,  until  I have  reaped  my  full  harvest  of 
laurels.  This  harvest  was  not  yet  gathered  in,  and  the  cries 

1 Dion,  lxiii.  11.;  Suet.  Ner.  32.  Nero,  it  will  be  remembered,  had  begun 

a systematic  robbery  of  Greece,  and  extended  it  to  Asia,  before  this  time.  See 

Tac.  Ann.  xvi.  23.,  and  above,  ch.  liii. 

a Suet.  Ner.  23. ; Dion,  lxiii.  12. 


A.  U.  820.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


277 


of  the  keeper  of  the  city,  already  trembling  for  the  fate  of 
the  empire,  were  disregarded,  while  there  yet  remained  a 
stadium  to  be  trodden,  or  a chaplet  to  be  won  in  Greece.  At 
the  commencement,  however,  of  the  year  821  the  aspect  of 
affairs  had  become  still  more  serious.1  Plots  for  the  subver- 
sion of  the  government  were  believed  to  be  rife  in  the  ar- 
mies of  the  West.  The  heads  of  administration  at  Pome 
knew  not  whom  of  their  officers  in  Gaul  or  Spain  to  trust. 
Deep  gloom  had  settled  down  on  the  upper  classes  in  the 
capital ; the  temper  of  the  populace  itself,  so  long  the  stay  of 
Nero’s  tyranny,  was  uncertain.  Helius  again  urged  him  to 
hasten  his  return.  He  crossed  over  to  Greece  to  confer  with 
him  in  person.  He  repeated  his  instances  with  increasing 
fervour.  At  last  when  there  seemed  no  more  of  fame  or 
booty  to  be  wrung  from  Greece,  Nero  deigned  to  take  ship, 
though  the  season  of  navigation  had  not  yet  commenced,  and 
urged  his  prow  through  stormy  seas  to  the  haven  of  Puteoli.2 

At  Delphi  he  had  consulted  the  oracle  about  his  future 
fortunes,  and  had  been  warned,  we  are  told,  against  the 
seventy-third  year , a response  which  seemed  to  Zero's  return 
the  youth  of  thirty  to  portend  a great  length  of  ^^pi^en- 
days,  but  was  found  in  the  sequel  to  have  anoth-  ^ into  Eome* 
er  and  a fatal  signification.3  Fortified,  however,  by  this  de- 
lusion, he  had  returned  to  Italy  with  little  anxiety,  and  when 
some  of  the  precious  objects  that  followed  in  his  train  were 
lost  by  shipwreck,  he  vaunted  in  the  plenitude  of  his  self-as- 
surance that  the  fishes  themselves  would  restore  them.  After 
losing  and  again  recovering  both  Britain  and  Armenia,  his 

1 We  must  place  at  this  period  the  futile  conspiracy  of  Yinicius  at  Beneven- 
tum,  which  is  cursorily  mentioned  by  Suetonius  {Ner.  36.),  but  by  no  other 
author. 

2 Dion,  lxiii.  19. 

3 Suet.  Ner.  40.  The  seventy-third  year  referred,  it  seems,  to  the  age  of  his 
successor  Galba.  The  story  we  may  suppose  was  invented  to  fit  the  event. 
The  oracle  at  Delphi  had  fallen  into  disrepute,  but  was  still  consulted  by  the 
vain  and  frivolous.  It  is  not  improbable  that  Nero  insisted  on  receiving  a re- 
sponse. Comp,  the  story  of  Appius  in  Lucan,  v.  122.  folL,  recounted  in  chap- 


278 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  68. 


confidence  in  his  good  fortune  had  become,  it  is  said,  unbound- 
ed. It  was  at  Xaples,  he  remembered,  that  he  had  com- 
menced his  long  course  of  artistic  victories.  Xow  arrived  at 
the  height  of  his  glory,  he  determined  to  celebrate  his  successes 
by  a triumphal  entry  into  the  Campanian  capital,  with  a team 
of  milk-white  horses.  The  walls  were  broken  down  to  admit 
the  chariot  of  the  Hieronicus,  and  the  same  extravagance 
was  repeated  when  he  entered  Antium,  his  native  place,  and 
the  Albanum,  his  favourite  residence,  and  once  more,  when 
he  presented  himself  before  Rome.1 *  He  drove  in  pomp 
through  the  city,  in  the  chariot  in  which  Augustus  had  tri- 
umphed, with  the  flutist  Diodorus  by  his  side  arrayed  in  a 
purple  robe,  and  a mantle  blazing  with  golden  stars,  wearing 
on  his  head  the  Olympian  coronal,  and  waving  the  Pythian 
in  his  hand.  He  was  preceded  by  a long  train  of  attendants 
bearing  aloft  his  other  chaplets  and  the  titles  of  all  his  vic- 
tories : he  was  followed  by  his  five  thousand  Augustani,  with 
loud  and  measured  acclamations,  as  the  soldiers  who  shared 
his  glory.  The  procession  passed  through  the  Circus,  some 
arches  of  which  were  demolished  to  admit  it,  and  thence  to 
the  V elabrnm  and  the  forum,  skirting  the  base  of  the  Pala- 
tine to  the  Porta  Mugionis,  the  chief  ascent  to  the  hill  and 
temple  of  Apollo  on  its  summit.  The  sacrifice  of  victims, 
the  flinging  of  odours,  and  every  other  accompaniment  of  a 
military  triumph,  were  duly  observed  in  this  mock  solemnity : 
the  statues  of  the  emperor  were  decked  with  crowns  and 
lyres  ; the  citizens  hailed  their  hero  with  the  titles  of  Xero- 
Apollo  and  Xero-Hercules,  invoking  his  divine  voice,  and 
pronouncing  all  who  heard  it  blessed.  The  affair  was  con- 
cluded by  the  striking  of  medals,  on  which  Xero  was  repre- 
sented, to  the  shame  and  horror  of  all  genuine  patriots,  in 
the  garb  of  a flute-player.3 

1 Suet  Xer.  25.  Brotier  cites  the  statement  of  Vitruvius,  ix.  praef. : u Xo- 
bilibus  athletis  qui  Olympia,  Pythia,  Isthmia,  Xemea  vicissent,  Graeco  rum  ma- 

jor es  ita  magnos  honores  constituerunt,  uti  . . . cum  revertuntur  in  suas  civi- 
tates  cum  victoria,  triumphantes  quadrigis  in  moenia  et  in  patrias  invehantur.” 

3 Dion,  lxiii,  20. ; Suet.  Xer.  25. 


A.  IT.  821.] 


ODER  THE  EMPIRE. 


279 


Bat  the  hour  of  retribution  was  at  hand.  Notwithstand- 
ing the  servile  flattery  of  the  senate,  and  the  triumphs  and 
supplications  it  had  decreed,  Nero  felt  uneasy  at  Digewitellt  ]n 
the  murmurs  no  longer  stifled,  and  the  undis-  the  provinces, 
sembled  gloom,  which  now  surrounded  him  in  his  capital, 
and  withdrew  himself  from  Rome  to  the  freer  air  of  Campania. 
Meanwhile  the  discontent  repressed  in  the  city  was  finding 
vent  in  the  provinces,  and  the  camps,  thronged  as  they  were 
with  kinsmen  of  the  mocked  and  injured  senators,  were 
brooding  over  projects  of  revenge.  Among  the  most  dis- 
tinguished of  the  officers  who  at  this  time  held  commands 


and  enjoyed  the  confidence  of  their  soldiers,  was  character  and 
Servius  Sulpicius  Galba,  who  for  several  years 
had  governed  the  Hither  Spain.  Connected  with 
the  first  families  of  Rome,  and  descended  from  Spain' 
many  heroes  of  the  camp  and  forum,  this  man  stood  high  in 
public  regard,  and  in  the  admiration  of  the  emperors  them- 
selves, for  his  courage,  his  skill,  and  his  austerity.  He  had 
deserved  well  of  Caius  for  the  vigour  with  which,  at  a critical 
moment,  he  drew  up  the  reins  of  discipline  in  the  Rhenish 
camps ; still  better  of  Claudius  for  refusing  the  offer  of  his 
own  soldiers  to  raise  him  to  empire  on  Caius’s  death.  He  had 
held  command  in  Aquitania,  and  was  for  two  years  proconsul 
of  Africa : he  had  received  the  triumphal  ornaments,  and 
been  admitted  to  the  priestly  colleges  of  the  Titii,  the  Quin- 
decemvirs,  and  the  August  ales.  Full  of  years  and  honours, 
he  had  retired  from  public  employment  through  the  first  half 
of  Nero’s  principate,  till  summoned  to  preside  over  the 
Tarraconensis.  He  exercised  his  powers  with  vigilance  and 
a harshness  which  perhaps  was  salutary,  until  the  emperor’s 
growing  jealousy  warned  him  to  shroud  his  reputation  under 
the  veil  of  indolence  or  even  neglect,  and  thus  he  escaped 
the  fate  of  Corbulo  and  lived  to  avenge  it.1  Galba  icas  in 
his  seventy-third  year.  In  his  childhood  he  had  been  brought, 


1 Suet  Galb.  9.  His  government  in  Spain  extended  over  eight  years,  from 
814  to  821.  Comp.  Plutarch.  Galb.  4. 


280 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  68. 


it  was  reported,  with  others  of  the  young  nobility,  to  salute 
the  aged  Augustus ; and  the  emperor,  taking  him  playfully 
by  the  cheek,  had  said,  And  thou  too , child , shalt  one  day 
taste  our  empire .*  Tiberius,  it  was  added,  had  learned  from 
the  diviner,  the  splendid  destiny  that  awaited  his  old  age, 
but  had  remarked  complacently,  that  to  himself  it  could  not 
m'atter.2  Nero,  it  seems,  whom  these  prognostications 
touched  more  nearly,  either  forgot,  or  was  lulled  to  false 
security  about  them. 

Early  in  the  winter  of  821,  while  Nero  was  still  absent  in 
Greece,  Galba  received  overtures  from  C.  Julius  Yindex, 
Overtures  for  a prefect  of  the  Farther  Gaul,  for  a simultaneous 
himb^vindex  rising.  Vindex  was  himself  a Gallo-Roman  scion 
in  Gaul.  0f  a r0yai  house  in  Aquitania,  adopted  into  the 

imperial  gens ; but  while  he  imbibed  the  pride  of  a Roman,  he 
retained  the  impetuous  spirit  of  his  ancestors  ; and  the  enor- 
mities of  Nero,  aggravated  no  doubt  in  his  esteem  by  his 
exactions  in  Gaul  itself,  roused  his  determination  to  over- 
throw him  without  a view  to  personal  aggrandizement.  The 
time  indeed  was  yet  far  distant  when  a foreigner  could  even 
conceive  the  idea  of  gaining  the  purple.  But  he  fixed  his 
eyes  on  Galba,  as  the  ablest  of  the  class  from  which  fortune 
could  make  an  emperor,  and  it  was  with  vexation  that  he 
found  the  old  chief  too  cautious  to  be  driven  headlong  into 
a revolt,  the  event  of  which  might  seem  so  doubtful.3 

Galba  indeed  had  good  reason  to  hesitate.  Nero  set  a 
price  on  the  head  of  Vindex,  whose  designs  were  speedily 
revealed  to  him,  and  though  the  forces  of  the 
^bres*\vith°n  Gaulish  province  were  disposed  to  follow  their 
chief,  the  more  powerful  legions  of  the  Lower 
Germany,  under  Virginius  Rufus,  were  in  full  march  against 

* Suet.  Galb.  4. : nal  cv}  t'ekvov,  rijc  apxVQ  W&v  tt aparpu^rj  . . . . “ vivat 
sane  quando  id  ad  nos  nihil  pertinet.”  The  same  presages  and  others  are  men 
tioned  also  by  Tacitus,  Ann.  vi.  20. ; Dion,  lvii.  19. ; Joseph.  Antiq.  xviii.  6 
19. 

8 Dion,  lxiii.  22,  23. ; Suet.  Galb.  6,  7.  8 Ibid. 


A.U.  821.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


281 


them.  The  armies  met  at  Vesontio,  and  there 

t-t-  -i  -i  rr*  • • ...  Disagreement 

V index  and  V lrgmius  at  a private  interview  between  then- 
agreed  to  conspire  together,  hut  their  troops  Sie  o/ve- 
could  come  to  no  such  understanding ; the  Vir- 
ginians attacked  the  soldiers  of  Yindex,  and  almost  cut  them 
to  pieces.  Vindex  thereupon,  with  the  haste  and  Yindex  Bla7S 
levity  of  his  race,  threw  himself  on  his  sword,  himself- 
and  the  rebellion  seemed  for  a moment  to  be  crushed.  But 
Galba  had  become  alarmed  for  his  own  safety.  He  had  re- 
ceived communications  from  a rebel,  all  whose  acts  were 
well  known  to  the  government.  He  had  been  urged  to 
proclaim  himself  emperor,  and  no  refusal  on  his  part  could 
efface  the  crime  of  having  been  judged  worthy  of  such  a 
distinction.  Indeed,  so  at  least  he  pretended,  he  had  already 
intercepted  orders  from  Hero  to  take  his  life,  and  a plot  for 
his  assassination  was  opportunely  detected  among  a com- 
pany of  slaves  presented  him  by  a freedman  of  the  emperor.1 
Thus  impelled  to  provide  for  his  own  safety,  he  called  his 
troops  together,  and  setting  before  them  the  images  of  the 
tyrant’s  noblest  victims,  harangued  them  on  the  state  of 
public  affairs.  The  soldiers  saluted  him  as  Irnpe- 

. . n i Galba  is  saluted 

rator,  but  he  would  only  allow  himself  to  be  imperatorby 

styled  Legatus  of  the  Senate  and  the  People.  MsM)ldiers* 
He  proceeded,  however,  at  once  to  prorogue  all  civil  business, 
and  provide  for  immediate  war  by  raising  forces  both  legion- 
ary and  auxiliary,  from  the  youth  of  the  province.  At  the 
same  time  he  convened  the  notables  of  the  country,  to  give 
perhaps  a civil  colour  to  his  military  enterprise.3 
The  Gaulish  and  Germanic  legions,  now  reunited,  cMmedUbyPhS 
after  the  death  of  Vindex,  had  offered  to  raise  declines  th? a- 
Virginius  to  the  purple ; they  conjured  him  to  e' 
assume  the  title  of  Imperator,  and  inscribe  on  his  busts  the 
names  of  Caesar  and  Augustus.3  But  he  steadily  refused  the 


1 Suet.  Galb.  9,  10.  2 Suet.  Her.  1.  c. 

3 Dion,  bail  25. ; Tacitus,  Hist  i.  8.,  speaks  more  hesitatingly : “ Nee  sta- 
tim  pro  Galba  Yirginius : an  imperare  voluisset  dubium : delatum  ei  a milite 
imperium  conveniebat.” 


282 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  68. 


honours  thrust  upon  him,  erased  the  obnoxious  letters,  and 
at  length  persuaded  his  admirers  to  leave  the  decision  of 
affairs  to  the  authorities  at  home.  He  entered,  however, 
into  communication  with  Galba,  who  had  now,  it  seems, 
determined  on  the  attempt,  and  the  news  was  bruited  far  and 
wide  that  Gaul  and  Spain  had  revolted,  and  that,  whoever 
might  eventually  obtain  the  empire,  it  had  passed  irrevoca- 
bly from  the  monster  Nero.1 * * * * 

At  once  it  appeared  how  many  pretenders  to  power 
might  exist  in  the  bosom  of  the  provincial  camps.  The  fatal 
other  candi  secret  °f  the  empire,  that  a prince  might  be  creat- 
dates  for  the  ed  elsewhere  than  at  Rome , so  long  undiscovered, 

empire.  Clau-  , 1 . ' 

diusMacerin  so  alien,  as  was  supposed,  trom  the  sentiments  of 

Africa,  Fon-  _ 7 _ . . 

teius  capito  in  the  age,  was  revealed  m more  than  one  quarter. 

Not  in  Gaul  and  Spain  only,  but  in  Africa  and  the 
Lower  Germany,  the  legions  were  ready  to  make  an  emperor 
of  their  own  chief.  Claudius  Macer  in  the  one,  Fonteius 
Capito  in  the  other,  were  proclaimed  by  the  soldiers.  At 
the  same  time  Salvius  Otho,  Nero’s  ancient  favourite,  who 
was  weary  of  his  long  oblivion  on  the  shores  of  the  Atlantic, 
declared  himself  a supporter  of  Galba,  and  lent  him  his  own 
slaves  and  plate,  to  swell  his  retinue  and  increase  his  re- 
sources. The  Civil  Wars  had  again  begun. 

Such  was  the  march  of  disaffection,  the  first  anticipations 
of  which  had  been  revealed  to  Helius  before  the  end  of  820, 
Nero  receives  and  had  induced  him  to  urge  the  emperor,  first 
revoito/vln-  ^ J letter  and  afterwards  in  person,  to  hasten 
dex*  home.  Nero,  as  we  have  seen,  could  not  be  per- 

suaded to  regard  them  seriously,  or  postpone  to  their  con- 
sideration his  paltry  gratifications  and  amusements.  After 
his  return  to  Rome,  he  had  again  quitted  it  for  Naples  in 
March,  821,  and  it  was  on  the  19th  of  that  month,  the  anni- 

1 Clinton  computes  that  Galba  allowed  himself  to  be  proclaimed  emperor  on 

the  3rd  April.  Fast.  Bom.  i.  50. 

a I adopt  here  the  well-known  observation  of  Tacitus  at  the  opening  of  his 

Histories : “ evulgato  imperii  arcano,  posse  principem  alibi  quam  Romae  fieri.” 

Hist.  i.  4. 


A.  U.  821.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


283 


versary  of  Agrippina’s  murder,  while  presiding  at  a gymnic 
exhibition,  that  he  received  the  news  of  the  revolt  of  Yindex. 
Still  he  treated  the  announcement  with  contempt,  His  levity  suc. 
and  even  expressed  satisfaction  at  the  prospect 
of  new  confiscations.  He  witnessed  the  contests  ^ptutu^con- 
with  unabated  interest,  and  retired  from  them  to  fidence* 
a banquet.  Interrupted  by  fresh  and  more  alarming  de- 
spatches, he  resented  them  with  petulant  ill-humour;  for 
eight  days  he  would  neither  issue  orders  nor  be  spoken  to  on 
the  subject.  Finally  arrived  a manifesto  from  Yindex  him- 
self, which  moved  him  to  send  a message  to  the  senate,  re- 
quiring it  to  denounce  the  rebel  as  a public  enemy ; but  he 
excused  himself  from  appearing  in  person,  alleging  a cold  or 
sore  throat  which  he  must  nurse  for  the  conservation  of  his 
voice.  Nothing  so  much  incensed  him  as  Yindex  calling 
him  Ahenobarbus  instead  of  Nero,  and  disparaging  his  skill 
in  singing.  Had  they  ever  heard  a better  performer  f he 
asked  peevishly  of  all  around  him.  He  now  hurried  trem- 
bling to  Rome ; but  he  was  reassured,  we  are  told,  on  the  way 
by  noticing  a sculpture  which  represented  a Gaulish  soldier 
dragged  headlong  by  a Roman  knight.1  Accordingly,  with 
his  usual  levity,  instead  of  consulting  in  full  senate,  or  har- 
anguing on  the  state  of  affairs  in  the  forum,  he  held  a hasty 
conversation  with  a few  only  of  his  nobles,  and  passed  the 
day  in  explaining  to  them  a new  water  organ,  on  which 
he  proposed,  he  said,  with  Yindex1  s good  leave , to  perform  in 
public.  He  completed  and  dedicated  a temple  to  Poppsea : 
once  more  he  celebrated  the  games  of  the  circus,  once  more 
he  played  and  sang  and  drove  the  chariot.  But  it  was  for 
the  last  time.  Yindex  had  fallen,  but  Galba,  it  Announcement 
was  now  announced,  had  raised  the  standard  of  °f  viSiu?on 
revolt.  The  rebel’s  property  in  Rome  was  im-  411(1  Galba- 
mediately  confiscated,  to  which  he  replied  by  selling  under 
the  spear  the  emperor’s  estates  in  Spain.  The  hour  of  retri- 
bution, long  delayed,  was  now  swiftly  advancing ; courier 


1 Suet.  Ner.  41. 


284 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  68. 


after  courier  was  dashing  through  the  gates,  bringing  news 
of  the  defection  of  generals  and  legions.  The  revolt  of 
Yirginius  was  no  longer  doubtful.  At  this  intelligence  the 
puny  tyrant  fainted  : coming  to  himself  he  tore  his  robes  and 
smote  his  head  with  pusillanimous  wailings.  To  the  con- 
solations of  his  nurse  he  replied,  with  the  cries  of  an  infant, 
Never  was  such  ill-fortune  as  his : other  Caesars  had  fallen  by 
the  sword , he  alone  must  lose  the  empire  still  living S At  last 
he  recollected  himself  sufficiently  to  summon  troops  from 
Illyricum  for  the  defence  of  Italy ; but  these,  it  was  found, 
were  in  correspondence  with  the  enemy.1 2  Another  resource, 
which  served  only  to  show  to  what  straits  he  was  driven, 
was  to  land  sailors  from  the  fleet  at  Ostia,  and  form  them 
into  a legion.3  Then  he  invoked  the  pampered  populace  to 
arise  in  his  behalf,  and  dressed  up  courtesans  and  dancers  as 
Amazons  to  attend  his  march : next  moment  he  exclaimed 
that  he  would  take  ship  for  Alexandria,  and  there  earn  sub- 
sistence by  singing  in  the  streets.4  Again  he  launched  into 
invectives  against  the  magistrates  abroad,  threatening  to 
recall  and  disgrace  them  throughout  his  dominions : the 
provinces  he  would  give  up  to  pillage,  he  would  slay  every 
Gaul  in  the  city,  he  would  massacre  the  senate,  he  would  let 
loose  the  lions  on  the  populace,  he  would  lay  Rome  in  ashes. 
Finally,  the  tyrant’s  vein  exhausted,  he  proposed  in  woman’s 
mood  to  meet  the  rebels  unarmed,  trusting  in  his  beauty,  his 
tears,  and  the  persuasive  tones  of  his  voice,  to  win  them  to 
obedience.5 

1 Suet.  Ner.  42. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  i.  9.  This,  I presume,  was  the  force  placed  under  Rubrius  Gal- 
lus;  Dion,  lxiii.  27. 

3 Plut.  Galb.  15.  4 Dion,  lxiii.  27.;  Plut.  Galb.  2. 

6 Suet. 'Ner.  43.  This  writer  affirms  that  Nero  deposed  both  the  consuls, 
and  assumed  the  fasces  himself  without  a colleague,  from  a persuasion  that  the 

Gauls  could  not  be  subdued  except  by  a consul.  The  story  is  not  supported  by 
other  authorities,  and  seems  in  itself  improbable.  Neither  Caesar  nor  Camillus 
were  consuls  when  they  conquered  the  Gauls.  Yet  such  a notion  might  have 
been  instilled  into  the  public  mind  by  the  victorious  consulships  of  Marius.  Or 
was  sole  consul  the  nearest  approach  an  emperor  could  make  to  the  office  of 


A.  U.  821.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


285 


Meanwhile  the  excitement  among  the  knights  and  sena- 
tors at  the  prospect  of  deliverance  kept  pace  with  the  pro- 
gress of  revolt  abroad.  Portents  were  occurring  Last  h(mrs 
at  their  doors.  Blood  rained  on  the  Alban  death  of  Nero, 
mount ; the  gates  of  the  Julian  sepulchre  burst  open  of  their 
own  accord.  The  Hundred  Days  of  Nero  were  drawing 
rapidly  to  a close.  He  had  landed  in  Italy  about  the  end 
of  February,  and  now  at  the  beginning  of  June  his  cause 
had  already  become  hopeless.  Galba,  though  steadfast  in 
his  resolution,  had  not  yet  set  his  troops  in  motion : never- 
theless, N ero  was  no  longer  safe  in  the  city.  The  people,  at 
first  indifferent,  were  now  clamouring  against  him ; for  there 
was  a dearth  of  provisions,  and  a vessel,  just  arrived  from 
Alexandria,  was  found,  to  their  disgust,  to  bear  not  grain, 
but  fine  sand  for  the  wrestlers  in  the  amphitheatre.1  The 
praetorians  had  been  seduced  by  their  prefect  Nymphidius, 
to  whom  the  camp  was  abandoned  by  the  flight  of  Tigelli- 
nus.  Nero  was  left  without  advisers;  the  senators  stood 
aloof;  of  Helius,  lately  so  powerful  and  energetic,  we  hear 
nothing.  Terrified  by  dreams,  stung  by  ridicule  or  deser- 
tion, when  his  last  hope  of  succour  was  announced  to  have 
deceived  him,  the  wretched  tyrant  started  from  his  couch  at 
supper,  upset  the  tables,  and  dashed  his  choicest  vessels  to 
the  ground ; then  taking  poison  from  Locusta  and  placing  it 
in  a golden  casket,  he  crossed  from  the  palace  to  the  Servil- 
ian  gardens,  and  sent  his  trustiest  freedman  to  secure  a gal- 
ley at  Ostia.2  He  conjured  some  tribunes  and  centurions, 
with  a handful  of  guards,  to  join  his  flight ; but  all  refused ; 
and  one  blunter  than  the  rest  exclaimed  tauntingly,  Is  it 
then  so  hard  to  die  f 3 At  last  at  midnight,  finding  that  even 

dictator  ? At  all  events  we  shall  find  the  consuls  in  their  chairs  immediately 
on  the  death  of  Nero. 

1 Suet.  Ner.  45.  Comp.  Plin.  Hist.  Nat.  xxxv.  47.:  “E  Nilo  arena.” 

2 Suet.  Ner.  47.  The  Romans  imagined  Locusta  a constant  attendant  at 
Nero’s  table.  So  in  the  rough  but  energetic  phrase  of  Tumus  (Fragm.  apud 
W emsdorf,  Poet.  Min.  iii.)  she  is  described  as : “ Circe  inter  vemas  nota 
Neronis.” 

s Suet.  Ner.  47.  A quotation  from  Virgil : “ Usque  adeone  mori  miserum  est  ?” 


286 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  1).  68. 


the  sentinels  had  left  their  posts,  he  sent  or  rushed  himself 
to  assemble  his  attendants.  Every  door  was  closed ; he 
knocked,  but  no  answer  came.  Returning  to  his  chamber, 
he  found  the  slaves  fled,  the  furniture  pillaged,  the  case  of 
poison  removed.  Not  a guard,  not  a gladiator,  was  at  hand 
to  pierce  his  throat.  I have  neither  friend  nor  foe , he  ex- 
claimed. He  would  have  thrown  himself  into  the  Tiber,  but 
his  courage  failed  him.  He  must  have  time,  he  said,  and 
repose  to  collect  his  spirits  for  suicide,  and  his  freedman 
Phaon  at  last  offered  him  his  villa  in  the  suburbs,  four  miles 
from  the  city.  In  undress  and  barefooted,  throwing  a rough 
cloak  over  his  shoulders,  and  a kerchief  across  his  face,  he 
glided  through  the  doors,  mounted  a horse,  and,  attended  by 
Sporus  and  three  others,  passed  the  city-gates  with  the  dawn 
of  the  summer-morning.1  The  Nomentane  road  led  him  be- 
neath the  wall  of  the  praetorians,  whom  he  might  hear  utter- 
ing curses  against  him,  and  pledging  vows  to  Galba ; and 
the  early  travellers  from  the  country  asked  him  as  they  met, 
What  news  of  Nero  ? or  remarked  one  to  another,  These 
men  are  pursuing  the  tyrant.  Thunder  and  lightning,  and  a 
shock  of  earthquake,  added  horror  to  the  moment.  Nero’s 
horse  started  at  a dead  body  on  the  road-side,  the  kerchief 
fell  from  his  face,  and  a praetorian  passing  by  recognised  and 
saluted  him.2  At  the  fourth  milestone  the  party  quitted  the 
highway,  alighted  from  their  horses,  and  scrambled  on  foot 
through  a cane-brake,  laying  their  own  cloaks  to  tread  on, 
to  the  rear  of  the  promised  villa.3 * * * * 8  Phaon  now  desired  Nero 

1 Suet.  Ner.  48.  Comp.  Dion,  lxiii.  27. ; Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  iv.  9.  2.; 

Eutrop.  vii.  9. ; Aur.  Yict  EpiL  5. 

3 “ Cadaver,”  possibly,  the  carcass  of  an  animal ; but  the  word  is  more 

commonly  used  for  a human  body.  The  odious  familiarity  of  the  Romans  with 

such  horrors  may  be  illustrated  from  the  story  told  of  Vespasian  (Suet  Vesp. 

5.).  “ Prandente  eo  quondam  canis  extrarius  e trivio  manum  humanam  intulit, 

mensaeque  subjecit.”  The  praetorian  met  the  party  on  his  way  towards  the 
city ; he  was  not  privy  to  the  change  of  feeling  among  his  comrades. 

8 The  villa  lay  between  the  Salarian  and  Nomentane  roads  (Suet  1.  c.), 
which  branched  off  from  the  city  at  the  Colline  gate.  Strab.  v.  3.  1. 


A.  U.  821. J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


287 


to  crouch  in  a sand-pit  hard  by,  while  he  contrived  to  open 
the  drain  from  the  bath-room,  and  so  admit  him  unperceived ; 
but  he  vowed  he  would  not  go  alive,  as  he  said,  underground, 
and  remained  trembling  beneath  the  wall.  Taking  water 
from  a puddle  in  his  hand,  This,  he  said,  is  the  famous  Drink 
of  Nero.1  At  last  a hole  was  made,  through  which  he  crept 
on  all  fours  into  a narrow  chamber  of  the  house,  and  there 
threw  himself  on  a pallet.2  The  coarse  bread  that  was  of- 
fered him  he  could  not  eat,  but  swallowed  a little  tepid  wa- 
ter. Still  he  lingered,  his  companions  urging  him  to  seek 
refuge,  without  delay,  from  the  insults  about  to  be  heaped  on 
him.  He  ordered  them  to  dig  a grave,  and  lay  down  him- 
self to  give  the  measure ; he  desired  them  to  collect  bits  of 
marble  to  decorate  his  sepulchre,  and  prepare  water  to 
cleanse  and  wood  to  burn  his  corpse,  sighing  meanwhile,  and 
muttering,  What  an  artist  to  perish .3  Presently  a slave  of 
Phaon’s  brought  papers  from  Rome,  which  Nero  snatched 
from  him,  and  read  that  the  senate  had  proclaimed  him  an 
enemy,  and  decreed  his  death,  in  the  ancient  fashion.  He 
asked  what  that  was  ? and  was  informed  that  the  culprit  was 
stripped,  his  head  placed  in  a fork,  and  his  body  smitten  with 
the  stick  till  death.  Terrified  at  this  announcement,  he  took 
two  daggers  from  his  bosom,  tried  their  edge  one  after  the 
other,  and  again  laid  them  down,  alleging  that  the  moment 
was  not  yet  arrived.  Then  he  called  on  Sporus  to  commence 
his  funereal  lamentations;  then  he  implored  some  of  the 
party  to  set  him  the  example ; once  and  again  he  reproached 
himself  with  his  own  timidity.  Fie ! Nero,  Fie ! he  mut- 
tered in  Greek,  courage,  man  ! come,  rouse  thee  ! Suddenly 
was  heard  the  trampling  of  horsemen,  sent  to  seize  the  cul- 

1 “ Haec  est  Neronis  decocta : ” Suet.  Dion.  In  allusion,  it  may  be  presum- 
ed, to  a beverage  of  water  boiled,  sweetened,  and  flavoured,  which  Nero  had 
himself  invented. 

2 Suet.  1.  c. : “ Quadrupes  per  angustias  effossac  cavernae  receptus  in  proxi- 
mam  cellam.”  The  Roman  houses  were  not  furnished  with  sewers,  but  every 
bath  had  its  drain. 

3 Suet.  1.  c. : “ Qualis  artifex  pereo ; ” Dion,  c.  29. 


288 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  68. 


prit  alive.  Then  at  last,  with  a verse  of  Homer  hastily  ejac- 
ulated, Sound  of  swift-footed  steeds  strikes  on  my  ears , he 
placed  a weapon  to  his  breast,  and  the  slave  Epaphroditus 
drove  it  home.1 2  The  blow  was  scarcely  struck,  when  the  cen- 
turion rushed  in,  and,  thrusting  his  cloak  against  the  wound, 
pretended  he  was  come  to  help  him.  The  dying  wretch 
could  only  murmur,  Too  late , and,  Is  this  your  fidelity  f and 
expired  with  a horrid  stare  on  his  countenance.  He  had  ad- 
jured his  attendants  to  burn  his  body,  and  not  let  the  foe 
bear  off  his  head ; and  this  was  now  allowed  him : the  corpse 
was  consumed  with  haste  and  imperfectly,  but  at  least  with- 
out mutilation.3 

Nero  perished  on  the  9th  of  June,  821,  at  the  age  of 
thirty  years  and  six  months,  in  the  fourteenth  year  of  his 
Extinction  of  principate.*  The  child  borne  him  by  Poppsea 
family6 * * * * with11  had-  died  in' infancy,  and  a subsequent  marriage 
■Nero-  with  Statilia  Messalina  had  proved  unfr *uitful.4 

The  stock  of  the  Julii,  refreshed  in  vain  by  grafts  from  the 
Octavii,  the  Claudii,  and  the  Domitii,  had  been  reduced  to 
his  single  person,  and  with  Nero  the  adoptive  race  of  the 
great  dictator  was  extinguished.  The  first  of  the  Caesars 
had  married  four  times,  the  second  thrice,  the  third  twice, 
the  fourth  thrice  again,  the  fifth  six  times,  and  lastly,  the 
sixth  thrice  also.  Of  these  repeated  unions,  a large  number 
had  borne  offspring,  yet  no  descendants  of  them  survived. 

1 Horn.  II.  x.  535. : ''Imruv  iC  uKvirddov  ajicfi  nrvirog  ovara  fiaXkei. 

2 Suet.  Ner.  49. 

3 The  day  was  said  to  be  the  anniversary  of  the  death  of  Octavia.  Clinton, 
Fast.  Rom.  i.  52.,  calculates  Nero’s  life  at  thirty  years  five  months  and  twenty- 
six  days,  counting  from  December  15.  790,  to  June  9.  821 ; his  reign  at  thir- 
teen years  seven  months  and  twenty-eight  days. 

4 The  death  of  Poppaea  had  been  quickly  followed  by  Nero’s  marriage  with 

Statilia  Messalina,  grand-daughter  of  Statilius  Taurus,  with  whom  he  had  pre- 

viously intrigued,  having  procured  the  death  of  her  husband,  Atticus  Yestinus, 

during  his  consulship,  to  obtain  her.  Suet.  Ner.  35. ; Tac.  Ann.  xv.  68,  69. 

The  consulship  and  execution  of  Vestinus  are  placed  in  the  year  818,  while 

Poppaea  was  still  alive.  We  hear  no  more  of  Statilia,  except  that  she  survived 

the  emperor. 


A.U.  821.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


289 


A few  had  lived  to  old  age,  many  reached  maturity,  some 
were  cut  off  by  early  sickness,  the  end  of  others  was  prema- 
ture and  mysterious ; but  of  the  whole  number  a large  pro- 
portion, which  it  would  be  tedious  to  calculate,  were  victims 
of  domestic  jealousy  and  politic  assassination.  Such  was  the 
price  paid  by  the  usurper’s  family  for  their  splendid  inherit- 
ance ; but  the  people  accepted  it  in  exchange  for  internal 
troubles  and  promiscuous  bloodshed ; and  though  they  too 
had  their  sacrifices  to  make,  though  many  noble  trees  were 
stripped  of  their  branches  under  the  Caesars  as  starkly  as  the 
Caesars  themselves,  yet  order  and  prosperity  had  reigned 
generally  throughout  the  empire ; the  world  had  enjoyed  a 
breathing  time  of  a hundred  years,  to  prepare  it  for  the  out- 
break of  civil  commotion,  for  the  fiercer  frenzy  of  interna- 
tional warfare,  which  are  next  to  be  related.  With  Nero 
we  bid  farewell  to  the  Caesars ; at  the  same  time  we  bid  fare- 
Tvell  to  the  state  of  things  which  the  Caesars  created  and 
maintained.  We  turn  over  a page  in  Roman  history.  On 
the  verge  of  a new  epoch  we  would  treat  with  grave  respect 
even  the  monster  with  whom  the  old  epoch  closes : we  may 
think  it  well  that  the  corpse  even  of  Nero  was  unmutilated; 
that  he  was  buried  decently  in  the  Domitian  gardens  on  the 
Pincian ; that  though  the  people  evinced  a thoughtless  triumph 
at  his  death,  as  if  it  promised  them  a freedom  which  they 
could  neither  use  nor  understand,  some  unknown  hands  were 
found  to  strew  flowers  on  his  sepulchre,  and  the  rival  king 
of  Parthia  adjured  the  senate  to  do  honour  to  his  memory.1 2 

Undoubtedly  the  Romans  regarded  with  peculiar  feeling 
the  death  of  the  last  of  the  Caesars.3  Nero  was  cut  off  in 

1 Suet.  JVer.  50.  57. : “Missis  ad  senatum  literis  ....  magno  opere  ora- 
vit,  ut  Neronis  memoria  coleretur.”  It  is  interesting  to  learn  that  the  tyrant’s 
obsequies  were  performed  by  two  nurses  of  his  infancy,  and  by  Acte,  the  part- 
ner of  his  first  excesses  ten  years  before. 

2 Suet.  Galb.  1.:  “ Progenies  Caesarum  in  Nerone  defecit.”  Eutrop.  vii.  9.; 
Oros.  vii.  7. ; Dion,  lxii,  18.,  who  cites  a Sibylline  verse: 

eoxaroQ  Aiveadtiv  fjLTjrpoKTovoQ  y-ye/Liovevaei. 

It  will  be  remembered  that  Nero  was  descended  through  Agrippina  from 
yol.  vi. — 19 


290 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  68. 


Expectation  of  earty  youth  ; he  perished  in  obscurity ; he  was 
his  return  entombed  in  a private  sepulchre  with  no  mani- 

among  both  . ,A 

Romans  and  festation  of  national  concern,  such  as  had  thrown 
a gleam  of  interest  over  the  least  regretted  of  his 
predecessors.  Yet  these  circumstances  would  not  have  suf" 
ficed  to  impart  a deep  mystery  to  the  event,  without  the  pre- 
disposition of  the  people  to  imagine  that  the  dynasty  which 
had  ruled  them  for  five  generations  could  not  suddenly  pass 
away,  finally  and  irrevocably.  The  idea  that  Nero  still  sur- 
vived, and  the  expectation  of  his  return  to  power,  continued 
long  to  linger  among  them.  More  than  one  pretender  arose 
to  claim  his  empire,  and  twenty  years  later  a false  Nero  was 
protected  by  the  Parthian s,  among  whom  he  had  taken  ref- 
uge, and  only  surrendered  to  the  repeated  and  vehement 
demands  of  the  Roman  government.1  This  popular  antici- 
pation was  the  foundation,  perhaps,  of  the  common  persua- 
sion of  the  Christians,  when  the  death  of  the  prince  was  no 
longer  questioned  that  he  should  revisit  the  earth  in  the 
character  of  Antichrist;  and  both  Romans  and  Christians 
seem  to  have  combined  in  believing  that  the  East,  and  possi- 
bly that  Jerusalem  itself,  would  be  the  scene  of  his  reappear- 
ance.2 

Julia,  the  daughter  of  Augustus  and  Scribonia.  His  connexion  with  the  Claudii 
was  only  adoptive. 

1 Suet.  Ner.  56.;  Tac.  Hist.  ii.  8.:  “Achaia  et  Asia  falso  exterritse,  velut 
Nero  adventaret.” 

2 Comp.  Suetonius,  Ner.  40. : “Praedictum  a mathematicis  Neroni  olim  erat 

fore  ut  destitueretur Spoponderant  tamen  quidam  destituto  Orientis 

dominationem,  nonnulli  nominatim  regnum  Hierosolymorum.”  There  will  be 
different  opinions  whether  this  idea  sprang  originally  from  the  Christians  or  the 
Romans ; probably  it  was  the  result  of  a common  feeling  reacting  from  one  to 
the  other. 


A.  U.  821. J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


291 


CHAPTER  LYI. 

THE  SENATE  ACCEPTS  GALBA  AS  EMPEROR. — HIS  VIGOUR  AND  SEVERITY. — STATE  OP 
THE  PROVINCES  AND  THE  LEGIONS. — GALBA  ADOPTS  PISO  AS  HIS  COLLEAGUE, 
AND  SUBMITS  HIS  CHOICE  FIRST  TO  THE  SOLDIERS  AND  AFTERWARDS  TO  THE 

SENATE. PUNISHMENT  OF  NERO’S  FAVOURITES. OTHO  INTRIGUES  FOR  THE 

EMPIRE,  AND  IS  CARRIED  BY  THE  SOLDIERS  INTO  THE  PRAETORIAN  CAMP  AND 
PROCLAIMED  EMPEROR. — GALBA  GOES  FORTH  TO  MEET  THE  MUTINEERS,  AND  IS 

ASSASSINATED,  TOGETHER  WITH  PISO. HIS  CHARACTER  AS  AN  EMPEROR. — OTHO 

SUCCEEDS,  AND  IS  THREATENED  WITH  THE  RIVALRY  OF  VITELLIUS. REVOLT  OF 

THE  LEGIONS  OF  GAUL. — VITELLIUS,  PROCLAIMED  EMPEROR,  ADVANCES  TOWARDS 
ITALY. — UNEASY  POSITION  OF  OTHO. — HE  PUTS  HIMSELF  AT  THE  HEAD  OF  HIS 
TROOPS,  AND  MARCHES  TO  PLACENTIA. — CAMPAIGN  IN  THE  CISALPINE. — BATTLE 

OF  BEDRIACUM. DEFEAT  OF  THE  OTHONIANS. OTHO  KILLS  HIMSELF. VIRGIN- 

IUS  REFUSES  THE  EMPIRE. — THE  SENATE  ACCEPTS  VITELLIUS. — HIS  GLUTTONY, 

SELFISHNESS,  AND  BARBARITY. ITALY  PLUNDERED  BY  HIS  SOLDIERS. HE  IS 

WITH  DIFFICULTY  DISSUADED  FROM  ENTERING  ROME  IN  ARMS  AS  A CON- 
QUEROR.— A.  d.  68,  69.  A.  u.  821,  822. 


AS  soon  as  they  were  informed  of  Nero’s  departure  from 
the  palace,  and  even  before  he  had  quitted  Rome,  the 
consuls  convened  the  senate  at  midnight.  Such  a summons, 
though  not  unprecedented,  betokened  a public 

..  ^ ^ The  senate  de* 

crisis,  and  when  the  fathers  hurried  to  the  place  crees  Nero  a 
of  meeting,  they  were  greeted  with  the  announce-  pubhc  enemy' 
ment  that  the  tyrant  despaired  of  his  throne  and  personal 
safety,  and  were  invited  to  declare  him  a public  enemy,  and 
pronounce  on  him  sentence  of  death.  They  were  assured  of 
the  utter  collapse  of  the  means  by  which  he  might  once  have 
hoped  to  make  head  against  the  enemy  : the  praetorians  had 
declared  openly  against  him ; some  battalions  he  had  sent  to 
meet  his  assailant  had  already  betrayed  his  cause ; the  troops 
in  or  near  the  city,  which  had  been  previously  drafted  from 


292 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  68. 


the  camps  in  Britain,  Germany,  and  Illyricum  for  -service  in 
the  East,  were  hostile  or  indifferent ; finally,  the  sailors  from 
the  fleet  at  Ostia  were  ready  to  sell  themselves  to  any  power 
which  could  hid  higher  for  them  than  the  bankrupt  emperor. 
No  doubt  with  money  in  hand  Nero  could  have  protracted 
the  contest ; but  his  means  had  been  exhausted  by  his  frivo- 
lous expenses,  and  the  senators  knew  that  it  was  only  by 
plundering  them  that  he  could  suddenly  replenish  his  coffers. 
If  they  still  hesitated,  the  news  that  the  wretched  tyrant  had 
fled  the  city  before  break  of  day  sufficed  to  reassure  them. 
They  now  felt  that  they  could  wreak  all  their  vengeance 
safely ; they  responded  with  acclamations  to  the  invitation 
of  their  chiefs,  and  in  launching  sentence  of  death  against  the 
culprit,  charged  their  ministers  to  take  him  alive  if  possible, 
that  they  might  enjoy  the  sight  of  his  expiring  agonies. 

This  savage  satisfaction  was,  as  we  have  seen,  denied 
them;  nevertheless  justice  was  done  on  the  tyrant,  and  the 
The  consuls,  state  was  saved.  So  the  senate  solemnly  declared, 
SuTand™’  an(l  the  people,  with  the  cap  of  liberty  on  their 
Bihus  itahcus.  heads,  rushed  in  crowds  to  the  temples  to  do  hom- 
age to  the  gods  who  had  struck  down  tyranny,  and  restored 
freedom  to  Rome.1  This  demonstration  of  the  populace  was 
indeed  worthless ; but  some  attempt  might  at  least  have  been 
expected  on  the  part  of  the  senate,  to  realize  and  secure  this 
boasted  liberty.  The  brave  Yirginius  had  asserted  its  right 
to  choose  an  emperor  ; such  was  the  furthest  extent  to  which 
a true  patriot  could  go  in  the  cause  of  the  republic,  and  such, 
it  was  fully  understood,  was  the  extent  of  Galba’s  meaning, 
when  he  proclaimed  himself  the  legatus  of  the  Senate  and 
People.  In  this  solution  of  the  crisis  all  civil  society,  at 
least  at  Rome,  was  prepared  to  acquiesce.  The  consuls  and 
the  tribunes,  the  patricians  and  the  commons,  were  equally 
satisfied  with  the  promise  held  out  to  them  from  beyond  the 

1 Suet.  Ner.  57.;  Dion,  lxiii.  29.;  Tac.  Hist.  i.  4.:  “Patres  laeti,  usurpata 
statim  libertate,  licentius,  ut  erga  principem  novum  et  absent  em.”  Yet,  what- 
ever licence  the  senate  assumed,  Tacitus  does  not  intimate  that  it  forgot  for  a 
moment  that  it  still  had  a master. 


A.  U.  821.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


293 


seas,  that  the  choice  of  the  army  should  he  submitted  to  the 
ratification  of  the  supreme  national  council.  Nor  were  the 
chiefs  of  the  senate  at  this  moment  men  of  bold  aspirations 
or  vigorous  resolution.  One  consul,  Galerius  Trachalus,  was 
noted  as  a florid  declaimer,  and  nearly  connected  with  the 
courtiers  of  the  empire ; the  other,  Silius  Italieus,  was  an 
orator  also,  and  a man  of  letters,  distinguished  in  later  years 
for  his  epic  on  the  Punic  Wars,  virtuous  and  amiable  in  pri- 
vate life,  discreet  and  dignified  in  oflice,  but  far  more  inclined 
to  sing  the  praises  of  the  Scipios  than  to  emulate  them.1  He 
beheld  Galba  descend  the  Pyrenees  and  the  Alps  with  his 
Iberian  and  Gaulish  auxiliaries;  but  he  was  dreaming  of 
Hannibal  and  the  Carthaginians,  and  never  woke  to  compre- 
hend the  actual  invasion  of  his  country,  and  subjection  of 
Home  by  the  sword. 

Galba,  we  have  seen,  had  been  proclaimed  imperator  on 
the  third  of  April.  He  was  still  engaged  in  making  his  prep- 
arations, or  watching  events,  within  his  own  The  senate 
province,  for  the  death  of  Vindex  had  alarmed,  eiec?ionofthe 
and  almost  shaken  him  from  his  purpose,  when  Galba- 
the  news  of  Nero’s  condemnation  and  death  was  brought 
him  by  one  who  professed  to  have  himself  beheld  the  body 
of  the  tyrant.  He  no  longer  delayed  to  advance ; but  it  was 
necessary  to  take  the  long  route  by  land,  necessary  also  per- 
haps to  have  a personal  interview  with  Yirginius,  and  ascer- 
tain his  real  intentions  and  the  disposition  of  the  Gaulish 
legions.  Arrived  at  Narbo,  Galba  was  met  by  envoys  from 
the  senate,  charged  to  convey  the  sanction  of  the  republic  to 
his  claim.  If  the  consuls  could  have  hesitated  for  a moment 
in  accepting  him  as  their  ruler,  they  would  have  been  impell- 
ed by  the  necessity  of  counteracting  the  intrigues  of  Nym- 

1 See  Clinton,  Fast.  Rom.  i.  52.  Martial  says  of  Silius,  vii.  63. : 

“ . . . . Bis  senis  ingentem  rexerat  annum 
Fascibus,  asserto  qui  sacer  orbe  fuit.” 

Comp,  also  Plin.  Ep.  iii.  7.  Galerius  was  an  intimate  friend  of  Otho,  and  a 
Galeria,  possibly  his  sister,  was  wife  to  A.  Yitellius,  the  son  of  the  eourtier  Lu- 
cius, soon  to  be  a prominent  competitor  for  the  purple.  Tac.  Hist.  i.  90. 


294 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  68. 


phidius  Sabinus,  the  prefect  of  the  praetorians,  who,  as  we 
have  seen,  had  withdrawn  his  cohorts  from  their  fidelity  to 
Nero,  and  now  hastened  to  offer  their  services  to  his  rival, 
with  many  compliments  and  presents,  asking  to  be  installed, 
in  return,  in  the  highest  offices  of  the  state.  But  Galba  was 
surrounded  already  by  close  adherents,  who  claimed  the  mo- 
nopoly of  his  favours.  T.  Yinius,  and  Cornelius  Laco,  who 
shared  and  perhaps  controlled  his  counsels,  required  him  to 
Abortive  at  reject  these  overtures.  Nymphidius,  stung  with 
tempt  ofNym-  disappointment,  conceived  the  hope  of  seizing 
the  empire  for  himself.  He  thought  himself  se- 
cure of  the  praetorians,  and,  in  order  to  gain  the  citizens  also, 
alleged  that  he  was  descended,  through  his  mother  Nymphi- 
dia,  from  the  emperor  Caius.  He  had  already  sought  their 
favour  by  surrendering  some  of  Nero’s  creatures  to  their 
vengeance,  and  had  made  so  much  blood  to  flow,  as  to  cause 
it  to  be  declared  in  the  senate  that,  if  things  went  on  thus, 
the  tyranny  of  Nero  himself  would  soon  be  regretted.  Un- 
doubtedly the  praetorians  as  a body  continued  restless  and 
discontented ; they  anticipated  the  loss  of  the  imperial  caresses 
which  under  Nero  had  been  extended  to  them  alone,  and  au- 
gured that  preference  under  the  new  reign  would  be  given 
to  the  faithful  legionaries.  Galba’s  character  for  severity 
and  parsimony  was  notorious,  and  his  caustic  saying  passed 
from  mouth  to  mouth,  that  he  was  wont  to  choose  his  sol- 
diers, not  to  buy  them i.1 2  Nevertheless,  the  enterprise  of  Nym- 
phidius  was  hopeless,  and  so  one  of  his  own  followers  had 
told  him,  assuring  him  that  not  one  family  in  Home  would 
voluntarily  accept  him  as  Caesar.3  What,  exclaimed  the 
tribune  Antonius,  shall  we  choose  NymphidicCs  son  for  our 
emperor,  and  sacrifice  to  him  the  child  of  Lima,  as  we  have 
already  sacrificed  the  child  of  Agrippina  ? Still,  even  in 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  5. : “ Accessit  Galbse  vox,  pro  republica  honesta,  ipsi  anceps, 
legi  ab  se  miltem  non  emi.1’  The  term  “ legere  ” is  derived  from  the  ancient 
practice  of  the  consul,  the  tribunes,  and  in  some  cases  perhaps  individual  sol- 
diers, choosing  the  best  names  for  service  from  the  roll. 

2 Plutarch,  Galb.  13. 


A.  U.  821.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


295 


the  licentious  camp  of  the  praetorians,  the  question  of  empire 
was  a question  of  descent  and  dynasty.  The  claims  of  the 
intriguer  were  laughed  to  scorn.  The  soldiers  swore  fidelity 
to  Galha,  and  closed  their  gates  against  his  rival.  When  he 
implored  admittance  and  rashly  trusted  himself  among  them, 
he  t^as  attacked  with  sword  and  spear,  and  cut  to  pieces 
without  scruple.1 

Meanwhile  Galba  was  approaching.  From  the  moment 
he  learned  that  the  senate  had  sworn  in  his  name,  he  dropped 
the  title  ofrLegatus  and  assumed  that  of  Cassar,  0f  BetuusCM- 
while,  to  indicate  that  he  was  engaged  in  actual  a%^0rnXsU3 
warfare  in  the  state’s  behalf,  he  marched  before  Sabinus- 
his  troops  cloaked  and  belted.2  Competitors,  indeed,  had 
risen  in  various  quarters.  Besides  Clodius  Macer  in  Africa, 
and  Fonteius  Capito  in  Germania,  whose  attempts  have  been 
already  mentioned,  we  read  of  a Betuus  Chilo  in  Gaul,  an 
Obultronius  and  a Cornelius  Sabinus  in  Spain.  But  these 
pretenders  were  put  down  by  the  adherents  of  the  senate  in 
their  own  districts ; they  were  all  slain  in  the  field,  or  taken 
and  executed ; and  Galba  himself,  as  the  chosen  of  the  sen- 
ate, was  held  responsible  for  their  deaths.  The  slaughter, 
indeed,  of  so  many  officers  of  rank  caused  some  dismay  at 
Rome,  and  this  was  increased  when  Galba  demanded  the 
sacrifice  of  such  of  Nymphidius’s  chief  supporters  as  had 
not  already  killed  themselves,  among  whom  was  the  consul 
designate  Cingonius  Yarro.  The  blood  of  Petronius  Turpi- 
lianus,  a consular,  was  also  required  without  form  of  trial,  as 
the  man  whom  Nero  had  appointed  to  the  command  of  his 
forces.  The  impression  of  Galba’s  severity  was  Galba,s  vigour 
further  enhanced  when,  on  arriving  at  the  Mil-  JuttinjSnin 
vian  Bridge,  he  replied  to  the  presumptuous  de-  his  °pp°nents* 
mands  of  Nero’s  marine  battalions  by  ordering  his  men  to 
charge  them,  and  so  entered  Rome  over  their  bodies.  The 
citizens  shuddered  at  the  omen ; but  the  scoffers  who  had 
made  a jest  of  the  emperor’s  gray  hairs,  and  contrasted  them 

1 Plutarch,  Galb.  14. 

2 Suet.  Galb.  11. : Dion,  My.  3. ; /cat  yepuv  icat  aoOevrjQ  rd  vevpo  cjv. 


296  HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS  [A.D.  69. 

with  the  beaming  locks  of  their  Claudian  Apollo,  were  effect- 
ually silenced.1 

On  the  first  of  January,  822,  Galha,  who  had  entered  the 
city  only  a few  days  previously,  assumed  the  consulship  to- 
„ „ gether  with  T.  Yinius,  and  all  classes  hastened 

Home  and  as-  to  the  Capitol  to  sacrifice  to  the  gods,  and  swear 

sumesthecon-  . A , 

suiship,  Jan.  l.  allegiance  to  the  new  emperor,  Six  months  had 
a.  n.  69.  elapsed  since  the  death  of  Xero,  and  the  citizens 
had  had  time  to  meditate  on  the  step  they  were 
pledged  to  take,  in  transferring  supreme  command  from  the 
divine  race  of  the  Julii  to  a mere  earthborn  dynasty,  to  a 
family  of  their  own  kind  and  lineage.  The  heroic  age  of  the 
empire  had  vanished  in  that  short  interval.  Whatever  anti- 
quarians and  courtiers  might  assert,  the  attempt  to  connect 
an  imperial  house  with  the  national  divinities  would  never 
succeed  again.  The  illusion  had  perished  like  a dream  of 
youth,  and  the  poetry  of  Roman  life  was  extinguished  for 
ever.  It  was  with  no  surprise,  with  no  shame,  that  the  citi- 
zens now  heard  of  new  pretenders  to  the  empire.  There 
was  no  other  claim  to  empire  but  force,  and  wherever  two 
or  three  legions  were  encamped  together,  there  resided  the 
. virtue  by  which  emperors  are  created.  Kotwith- 

State  of  the  J . 

provinces  and  standing  the  rapid  rout  and  disappearance  of 

attitude  of  the  _ „ , ° . , . r 1 

legions  and  Galba  s rivals  m the  provinces,  fresh  competitors 

their  chiefs.  ...  _ _ . 

might  arise  at  any  moment,  and  almost  in  any 
place,  and  it  was  with  deep  anxiety  that  patriots  inquired 
what  was  the  state  of  the  provinces,  the  temper  of  their  gar- 
risons, and  the  character  of  their  chiefs.  The  East,  they 
learned,  was  as  yet  undisturbed.  Syria  was  held  by  Licinius 
Mucianus,  a man  who,  after  a career  of  dissipation  and  place- 
hunting  in  the  city,  had  been  removed  thus  far  from  home 
by  the  jealousy  rather  than  the  fears  of  Claudius,  and  had 
been  raised  unexpectedly  to  the  government  by  Rero  on  the 
sudden  disgrace  of  Corbulo.  Vespasian,  though  command- 

1 Plut  Galb.  15. ; Tac.  Hist.  L 7. : “Ipsa  aetas  Galbse  irrisui  et  fastidio  erat, 
assuetis  juventae  Neronis,  et  imperatores  forma  et  decore  corporis,  ut  mos  est 
vulgi,  comparantibus.” 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


297 


ing  the  forces  now  destined  for  the  final  reduction  of  Judea, 
was  under  the  orders  of  his  proconsul,  whose  indolence  was 
satisfied  with  the  second  place  in  the  empire,  when  he  might 
have  contended  with  Gaiba  for  the  first.  Egypt,  though 
nominally  held  direct  from  the  emperor  at  Rome,  was,  in 
fact,  dependent  at  this  moment  on  the  attitude  of  Syria ; and 
thus  the  chief  granary  of  the  city  was  secured  for  the  elect 
of  the  senate.  Africa,  on  the  death  of  Clodius  Macer,  had 
devoted  itself  to  Gaiba;  the  two  Mauretanias,  Rhaetia,  Rori- 
cum,  and  Thrace,  all  governed  nominally  by  imperial  pro- 
curators, were  swayed,  in  fact,  by  the  impulse  given  them 
by  the  legions  of  the  nearest  frontiers.1  On  the  Rhine  the 
authority  of  the  new  emperor  was  less  placidly  admitted. 
Though  the  southern  and  central  parts  of  Gaul  were  gener- 
ally well  disposed  to  the  government  established  at  Rome, 
partly  from  their  attachment  to  Yindex,  the  first  of  Galba’s 
allies,  partly  from  satisfaction  with  the  privilege  they  enjoyed 
of  the  Roman  franchise  and  immunity,  there  were  certain 
spots  on  which  the  new  emperor  had  laid  his  hand  heavily, 
others,  from  their  position  connected  in  feeling  with  the  le- 
gions of  the  Upper  and  Lower  Germany,  were  less  disposed 
to  acquiesce  in  the  decision  of  the  city.  The  Germanic  le- 
gions, divided  into  two  armies,  each  three  or  four  legions 
strong,  were  hostile  to  Gaiba.2  The  passions  which  had  ex- 
cited some  of  them  to  draw  their  swords  against  the  troops 
of  Yindex,  were  inflamed  rather  than  allayed  by  victory. 
They  wanted  to  present  Yirginius  to  the  senate  as  the  chosen 
of  the  army ; they  were  not  satisfied  with  his  refusal  to  ac- 
cept the  empire : Gaiba  had  enticed  him  into  his  own  camp, 
and  carried  him  oft',  far  from  his  own  devoted  legions,  to 
Rome.3 * * *  The  Upper  army,  deprived  of  its  favourite  chief, 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  11. 

2 Of  the  exact  number  of  these  legions,  and  the  names  by  which  they  were 

distinguished,  I shall  have  occasion  to  speak  hereafter.  The  proper  comple- 

ment of  these  frontier  provinces  was  four  to  each,  as  has  been  stated  from 

Tacitus  elsewhere,  but  one  of  them,  at  least,  the  Fourteenth,  had  been  drafted 

into  Britain.  8 Tac.  Hist . i.  9. 


298 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


disdained  the  rule  of  Hordeonius  Flaccus,  an  old  and  sickly 
general.  The  Lower  army  had  given  some  countenance  to 
the  attempt  of  Fonteius,  and  was  ashamed  of  his  easy  over- 
throw. Galba  humoured  its  vanity  by  sending  it  a consular 
legate,  Aulus  Yitellius;  but  the  art  and  industry  of  this 
commander,  in  redressing  its  grievances  and  consulting  its 
wishes,  aimed  at  forming  an  interest  for  himself  rather  than 
riveting  obedience  to  his  master.1  The  four  legions  in  Brit- 
ain were  occupied  in  their  insular  warfare ; they  were  intent 
on  securing  estates  and  plunder,  to  form  the  basis  of  their 
own  fortunes  in  the  land  of  their  adoption.  They  took  no 
interest  in  the  mutations  of  empire  at  Rome. 

A few  days  after  the  first  of  January  letters  reached  the 
palace  announcing  a mutiny  of  the  troops  of  Upper  Germa- 
Mutinyofthe  nia.  They  demanded  another  emperor  in  the 
per  Oer m aSia.  place  of  Galba,  but  left  the  choice  to  the  senate 
mines  tfadopt  anc^  people.  Galba  had  already  contemplated 
Kuefin  tie  adopting  an  associate  in  the  empire,  and  had  dis- 
empire.  cussed  the  matter  with  the  most  intimate  of  his 

friends ; for  with  the  indecision  of  old  age,  or  possibly  his 
natural  character,  he  rarely  acted  on  his  own  counsels,  and 
was,  indeed,  generally  an  instrument  in  the  hands  of  others. 
The  project  had  become  known,  and,  while  the  choice  of  the 
imperial  conclave  was  yet  uncertain,  the  citizens  weighed 
among  themselves  the  merits  of  the  presumed  candidates. 
The  noblest  birth  and  most  ancient  lineage  were  doubtless  to 
be  combined  with  high  personal  merits : the  position  of  the 
Caesar  required  to  be  strengthened  by  an  appeal  to  popular 
prejudice,  and  no  mere  favourite  of  the  palace  could  hope  to 
satisfy  the  demands  of  the  people  at  large.  Accordingly, 
Vinius,  despairing  for  himself,  was  content  to  urge  the  claims 
of  Salvius  Otho,  while  Laco  and  the  freedman  Icelus  recom- 
mended Piso  Licinianus,  a descendant  of  the  Crassi  and 
Pompeii,  a man  whose  high  birth  as  well  as  his  noble  charac- 
ter had  entailed  on  him  the  hatred  of  Nero,  and  subjected 


1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  9.  52. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


299 


him  to  banishment.  No  time  was  now  to  he  lost.  Galha 
called  together  Vinius  and  Laco,  with  Marins  Celsus,  a con- 
sul designate,  and  Ducennius  Geminus,  prefect  of  the  city,  and 
transacted  with  them,  in  the  phrase  of  Tacitus,  the  comitia  of 
the  empire.  Their  deliberations  ended  in  the  choice  of  Piso, 
to  whom,  from  the  antique  severity  of  his  habits  and  gravity 
of  his  demeanour,  Galba  was  personally  inclined.  But  these 
qualities  were  too  similar  to  those  of  the  emperor  himself  to 
reassure  such  among  the  citizens  as  trembled  at  his  growing 
unpopularity.1 

Nothing  can  be  more  grave  and  dignified  than  this  elec- 
tion of  an  emperor,  as  represented  to  us  by  the  most  thought- 
ful expounder  of  Roman  constitutional  history.2  This  a(l0pti0n 
The  aspirations  of  philosophers,  the  contrivances  terS  of  the™* 
of  practical  statesmen,  had,  at  last,  and  for  once,  senate* 
attained  their  highest  realization.  Here  was  the  best  man 
of  the  commonwealth  choosing  the  next  best  for  his  child, 
his  associate,  and  his  successor.  The  union  of  the  Licinian 
and  Scribonian  houses  with  the  Lutatian  and  Sulpician  pro- 
claimed the  reinstatement  of  the  Senatorial  party,  as  opposed 
to  the  champions  of  the  Plebs  who  had  so  long  trampled  on 
the  faction  of*  the  Optimates.  But  besides  this  class-demon- 
stration, demanded  by  the  position  of  the  new  dynasty,  jus- 
tified by  the  forfeiture  of  its  rivals,  the  improvement  now 
introduced  on  the  example  of  Augustus,  who  chose  a suc- 
cessor from  his  own  family,  not  from  the  citizens  out  of 
doors, — the  selection  of  a younger  before  an  elder  brother, 
for  his  personal  qualifications,  for  an  elder  Piso  had  been 
passed  over, — the  well-known  character  of  the  adopted,  his 
mature  age,  his  blameless  life,  his  constancy  under  adverse 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  14. : “ Ea  pars  morum  ejus,  quo  suspectior  solicitis,  adoptanti 
placuit.” 

2 Of  the  six  persons  present,  indeed,  three  at  least  perished  immediately 
afterwards,  and  the  account  given  us  by  Tacitus  of  the  speech  of  Galba,  and  the 
demeanour  of  Piso,  rests  at  best  on  popular  rumour  only.  Tac.  Hist.  i.  15-17. : 
“Galba  ....  in  hunc  modum  locutus  fer.tur  . . . Pisonem  ferunt”  . . . 
language  in  which  our  author  sometimes  disguises  a dramatic  invention  of  his 
own. 


300 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  69. 


fortune, — all  these  circumstances  combined  to  secure  for  this 
appointment  the  suffrage  of  patriots  and  statesmen  beyond 
the  ranks  of  any  single  order,  or  any  party  in  the  nation. 
The  problem  of  government  was  solved : — could  we  but  shut 
out  the  recollection  of  what  preceded,  and  what  followed, — 
the  usurpation  by  one  legion  and  the  overthrow  by  another, 
— the  proof  made  patent  to  posterity  that  neither  the  crea- 
tion of  Galba,  nor  the  adoption  of  Piso,  was  the  work  of  the 
commonwealth  itself  as  founded  on  the  will  of  the  people  ! 
Taken  by  itself  no  public  act  was  ever  more  virtuous ; but  it 
had  no  firmer  support  than  a fierce  but  unsubstantial  reac- 
tion of  public  feeling,  and  its  fortunes  proved  as  baseless  as 
its  origin. 

Galba  conferred  the  empire  with  magnanimity ; Piso 
accepted  it  respectfully  and  modestly,  as  a burden  laid  on 
Galba  submits  him  by  his  own  order,  which  with  him  was 
tie  approval  of  equivalent  to  the  commonwealth ; the  bystanders 
his  legions.  looked  on  with  anxiety  or  envy ; to  the  good,  the 
innovation  seemed  fraught  with  peril,  for  it  seemed  to  intro- 
duce a principle  of  rivalry  within  the  walls  of  the  palace  itself ; 
while  the  bad,  with  whom  power  at  any  price  was  the  height 
of  human  ambition,  grudged  Piso  his  luck  in  having  power, 
however  precarious,  thus  thrust  upon  him.  But  how  should 
this  domestic  arrangement  be  publicly  ratified  ? what  forms 
should  be  observed,  what  power  in  the  state  appealed  to  for 
its  sanction  ? The  association  of  Agrippa,  and  afterwards 
of  Tiberius,  with  Augustus,  had  been  rather  implied  by 
significant  charges  than  directly  submitted  to  the  approval 
of  the  State.  Galba  had  no  reserve  : his  only  wish,  in  the 
interest  of  his  tottering  government,  was  to  secure  the  most 
effective  recognition  of  the  act  he  had  accomplished.  Should 
he,  then,  declare  his  will  to  the  people  from  the  rostra,  and 
invite  their  acceptance  ? or  should  he  call  for  a vote  of  the 
senate  ? or,  lastly,  should  he  demand  the  salutation  of  the 
army  ? A soldier  himself,  and  raised  to  power  by  the  sol- 
diers, Galba  knew  where  his  real  strength  lay,  and  he  de- 
termined to  lead  his  destined  successor  to  the  camp,  and 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


301 


present  him  as  such  to  his  companions  in  arms : he  might 
hope  to  engage  the  affections  of  the  legions,  which  he  sternly- 
refused  to  buy  with  money,  by  a compliment  to  their  pride. 
On  the  10th  of  January  the  emperor  carried  his  purpose  into 
execution.  He  briefly  announced  his  choice  to  the  soldiers, 
citing  the  example  of  Augustus,  and  appealing  to  the  way 
in  which  the  legionaries  chose  recruits ; but  it  -was  in  a storm 
of  rain  and  thunder,  such  as  in  the  olden  time  would  have 
deterred  the  magistrate  from  holding  a public  election,  and 
— a portent  more  fatal  and  now  more  unusual — he  accompa- 
nied the  announcement  with  no  promise  of  a donative* 
Though  the  tribunes,  and  centurions,  and  the  His  untimely 
first  rank  of  the  soldiers  responded  with  the  ex-  £e‘ 

pected  acclamations,  the  serried  files  behind  donative- 
maintained  a gloomy  silence,  sufficiently  indicative  of  surprise 
and  ill-humour.  The  officers  themselves  declared  that  a 
trifling  largess  would  have  sufficed  to  conciliate  them ; but 
Galba  was  stern  and  immovable.  It  was  a moment  when  a 
wise  man  would  have  temporized  : but  Galba,  intelligent 
and  able  as  he  was,  had  no  wisdom.1 

From  the  camp  the  emperor  turned  to  the  Senate-house. 
His  address  to  the  senators  was  not  less  curt  than  that  to  the 
soldiers,  and  was  conceived  perhaps  in  language  The  adoption 
scarcely  less  military.  But  it  was  followed  im-  sSactio^by 
mediately  by  a more  graceful  harangue  from  thesenate- 
Piso  ; and,  whatever  doubt  or  jealousy  might  prevail  in  some 
sections  of  the  assembly,  on  the  whole  the  act  was  felt  as  a 
compliment  to  the  order,  and  greeted  with  general  appro- 
bation. The  first  care  of  the  now  constituted  government 
was  to  send  legates  to  control  the  disaffected  or  vacillating 
legions,  the  Fourth  and  the  Eighteenth,  on  the  Rhine ; the 
next,  to  restore  the  finances  of  the  state,  and  supply,  with  no 
irregular  severity  or  injustice,  the  necessities  of  its  chief, 
who  found  an  empty  treasury,  with  a hungry  populace  at  its 
doors.  Galba’s  first  measure  was  to  demand  the  Measures  for 
restitution  of  the  sums  Hero  had  lavished  on  his  ofe^ertf?&-ent 
unworthy  favourites,  computed  to  amount  to  vourites- 
1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  17. 


302 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


twenty-two  millions  of  sesterces,  leaving  them,  in  scorn  or 
pity,  one-tenth  only  of  their  plunder.1  Thirty  knights  were 
constituted  a hoard  for  the  recovery  of  these  moneys ; hut 
the  inquisition,  as  might  he  expected,  was  not  generally 
successful.  The  grantees,  it  was  alleged,  had  squandered 
their  grants  as  fast  as  they  obtained  them,  and  no  assets 
were  forthcoming  to  clear  their  debt  to  the  public.  It  was 
some  consolation  that  the  wretches  to  whom  Nero  had  given 
were  found  as  poor  as  those  from  whom  he  had  taken. 
Another  measure  was  directed  to  secure  power  over  the 
soldiers.  Galha  began  by  dismissing  some  of  the  tribunes 
of  the  praetorian  and  urban  guard,  intending,  no  doubt, 
gradually  to  rid  himself  of  his  least  trustworthy  officers ; but 
the  process  was  marked  enough  to  cause  alarm,  while  it  was 
too  slow  to  effect  its  object.2  On  the  whole,  neither  the 
people  nor  the  soldiers  were  satisfied  with  the  new  emperor’s 
policy ; but  he  was  misled,  apparently,  by  the  counsels  of 
Yinius,  who  induced  him  indiscreetly  to  spare  the  life  of 
Tigellinus,  when  the  most  obnoxious  of  Nero’s  favourites 
were  led,  amid  general  acclamations,  to  the  scaffold.  Nothing, 
it  is  said,  would  have  so  delighted  the  citizens  as  to  have 
seen  Tigellinus  dragged,  like  Sejanus,  through  the  forum. 

They  continued  to  call  for  his  head  in  the  theatre 

Galba  gives  of-  J . . 

fence  by  spar-  and  the  circus ! but  V mius  had  engaged  to 

ing  Tigellinus.  _ . , ’ . _ . ° ° 

marry  his  daughter,  a widow  with  a large  dower, 
and  for  her  sake  he  persuaded  Galba  to  screen  the  guilty 
father,  and  proclaim  that  he  was  sinking  fast  under  a natural 
disease.3  Nor  were  the  frugal  soldier’s  habits  conducive  to 
popularity.  Trifling  instances  of  his  parsimony  were  re- 
ported, and  possibly  exaggerated.  He  had  groaned  aloud 
when  a rich  banquet  was  served  him.  He  had  rewarded  the 
diligence  of  his  chamberlain  with  a dish  of  lentils.  He  had 
marked  his  content  with  a distinguished  flutist  by  presenting 
him  with  five  denarii,  drawn  deliberately  from  his  own 

1 Tac.  Hist  i.  20. ; Plut.  Galb.  16. 

2 Tac.  Hist  1.  c. : “ Nec  remedium  in  caeteros  fiiit,  sed  metus  initium.” 

3 Plut.  Galb.  11. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


303 


pocket.1  Such  was  the  successor  of  the  refined  Augustus, 
and  the  magnificent  Nero. 

There  was  no  man  at  Rome  whose  personal  views  were 
so  directly  thwarted  by  the  elevation  of  Piso  as  Otho’s ; 
none  felt  himself  so  aggrieved,  none  was  so  bold,  oth0i  mortified 
so  unscrupulous,  in  seeking  redress.  Otho  still  of  pfso!ddeP-tiou 
smarted  under  the  recollection  of  his  exile  ; for,  ^ 
honourable  though  it  was,  the  command  of  a empire- 
rude  and  distant  province,  protracted  through  the  ten  best 
years  of  life,  could  be  regarded  only  as  an  exile ; and  yet 
even  this  was  a milder  penalty  than  he  might  expect  from 
the  jealousy  of  his  new  rulers.2  If  Galba,  with  the  serenity 
of  his  age  and  character,  could  venture  to  disregard  his 
rivalry,  he  expected  no  such  indulgence  from  the  younger 
Caesar,  too  sure  to  retaliate  on  a man  of  years  and  position 
like  his  own  the  jealousy  he  had  himself  incurred  from 
Nero.  Long  steeped  in  every  luxury,  and  every  sensual 
gratification  exhausted,  Otho  held  his  life  cheap : he  resolved, 
from  pride  and  caprice,  to  throw  the  die  for  empire  as  the 
only  excitement  now  remaining,  conscious  of  all  its  hazard, 
and  content  to  perish  if  unsuccessful.  Such  a temper  was  a 
fearful  symptom  of  the  times.  In  this  combination  of  volup- 
tuousness and  daring,  in  fascination  of  manners  and  reckless- 
ness of  disposition,  in  lust  of  place  and  power,  and  contempt 
for  the  dangers  which  environed  them,  Otho  may  remind  us 
of  Catilina  ; but,  in  atrocity  of  purpose,  he  stands  a full  step 
in  advance,  inasmuch  as  Catilina  was  impelled  to  treason  at 
least  by  an  urgent  necessity,  while  Otho  plunged  into  it  from 
mere  wantonness  and  the  pleasure  of  the  game.  The  excuse 
he  pleaded  could  not  have  imposed  even  on  himself.  For  a 
loyal  subject,  even  though  once  a friend  of  Nero,  there  was 
no  insecurity  under  Galba,  nor  need  he  have  despaired  of 
winning  the  confidence  of  Piso.  He  had  gained  credit  for 
moderation  in  his  ten  years’  government ; a new  career  of 

1 Suet.  Galb.  12. 

2 Suet.  Otho , 3. : “ Proyinciam  administravit  qusestoribus  (i.  e.  by  civil,  not 
military,  officers),  per  decern  annos;”  i.  e.  from  811  (Dion,  lxi.  11.)  to  821. 


304 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


virtue  and  reputation  was  open  to  him.  But  Otho  was  an 
elegant  gambler : his  virtues  had  been  as  capricious  as  his 
vices ; he  was  weary  of  decorum,  and  now,  long  restrained 
from  the  gratification  of  his  passion,  he  rushed  back  to  the 
table  with  a madman’s  frenzy,  prepared  to  stake  his  life 
against  his  evil  fortune. 

And  Otho  had  other  counsellors  than  Catilina.  Instead 
of  being  the  centre  of  a group  of  vicious  associates,  the  oracle 
of  bankrupts  and  prodigals,  he  was  himself 

Otho  tampers  r . r . ..  _ „ 

with  the  com-  swayed  by  false  impostors,  the  victim  of  flatter- 
ers and  diviners.  His  wife  Poppsea,  who  had 
passed  him  in  the  race  of  ambition,  had  entertained  a para- 
sitical brood  of  astrologers  about  her ; Otho  had  yielded  to 
the  same  fascinations  also ; and  when  the  promise  of  his 
soothsayer  Ptolemseus,  that  he  should  outlive  Nero,  had 
turned  out  true,  he  embraced  with  transport  a second  reve- 
lation, that  he  should  become  associated  in  the  empire.1 
Ptolemaeus  himself,  when  he  found  how  much  his  patron’s 
imagination  was  inflamed,  spared  no  means  to  effect  the 
fulfilment  of  his  own  prophecy.  The  state  of  the  legions  in 
the  provinces,  the  temper  of  the  soldiery  at  Rome,  alike 
suggested  grounds  of  hope,  and  furnished  objects  to  tamper 
with.  The  troops  which  Galba  had  led  from  the  heart  of 
Spain  to  the  Tiber  felt  aggrieved  by  the  length  of  their 
pilgrimage ; for,  stationed  in  their  frontier  camps,  the  legions 
were  not  often  required  to  make  distant  marches,  and  the 
battalions  destined  for  the  East  or  the  West  were  generally 
transported  almost  to  their  appointed  quarters  by  sea.  Their 
toils  might,  indeed,  be  recompensed,  the  remembrance  of  the 
dust  and  heat  of  the  way  might  be  sweetened  by  largesses ; 
but  Galba  had  stiffly  refused  to  administer  such  silver  salves, 
and  they  now  stood,  cap  in  hand,  soliciting,  by  gestures  if 
not  with  words,  the  liberality  of  the  soldier’s  friend,  such  as 
Otho  studied  to  represent  himself.  Accordingly,  when  he 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  22. ; Plut.  Galb.  23.,  by  whom  the  man  is  called  Ptolemseus. 
Suetonius,  Otho , 4.,  gives  him  the  name  of  Seleucus,  which  may  be  a confusion 
with  the  name  of  the  soothsayer  of  Vespasian.  Hist.  ii.  78. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


305 


received  the  emperor  at  supper,  his  creature  Msevius  Pudens 
slipped  a gratification  into  the  hands  of  the  guard ; and  to 
this  general  munificence  he  added  lavish  acts  of  generosity 
to  individuals.1 2  It  is  observable,  indeed,  that  these  efforts 
were  directed  to  the  lower  ranks  rather  than  to  the  officers.  . 
The  tribunes  and  centurions  were  loyal  to  their  imperator, 
faithful  to  their  military  oath  ; they  were  superior,  perhaps, 
to  the  petty  causes  of  discontent  which  moved  the  turbulent 
multitude.  Nevertheless,  in  the  general  relaxation  of  disci- 
pline, and  the  confusion  incident  to  the  assemblage  of  various 
corps  in  the  city,  a movement  in  the  ranks  alone  might 
spread  with  sympathetic  excitement.  We  have  often  seen 
already  how  powerless  were  the  officers  against  the  contagion 
of  insubordination  among  their  men.  The  privates  were 
seduced,  the  legion  was  carried  over.  Two  manipulars 
engaged  to  transfer  the  empire  of  the  Roman  people , says 
Tacitus,  in  memorable  words,  and  they  did  transfer  it .* 
Murmurs  at  the  refusal  of  a largess,  sighs  for  the  licence  of 
Nero’s  reign,  disgust  at  the  prospect  of  marching  again  to 
the  frontiers,  ran  like  wildfire  along  the  ranks  ; the  news  of 
the  revolt  in  Germany  shook  the  common  faith  in  Galba’s 
authority,  and  as  early  as  the  fourteenth  of  January,  the  fifth 
day  from  Piso’s  appointment,  the  praetorians  were  prepared 
to  carry  Otho  to  the  camp  at  nightfall,  had  not  their  leaders 
feared  their  making  some  blunder  in  the  darkness,  and  seiz- 
ing perhaps  on  the  wrong  man  in  the  confusion  of  the 
moment.  Yet  delay  was  dangerous  ; indications  of  the  con- 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  24.  According  to  Suetonins,  Otho  was  so  deeply  involved  in 
debt,  that  he  declared  he  could  not  exist  unless  he  became  emperor  ( Otho,  5.) : 
he  must  be  cut  in  pieces,  either  by  the  soldiers  in  the  field,  or  by  his  creditors 
in  the  forum.  He  raised  many  men  for  his  desperate  enterprise  by  selling  a 
place  about  the  court  for  a million  of  sesterces : “ hoc  subsidium  tanti  ccepti 
fuit.” 

2 Tac.  Hist.  L 25. : “ Suscepere  duo  manipulares  Imperium  pop.  Rom. 
transferendum ; et  transtulerunt.”  “ Manipulares,”  privates : but  one  was, 

“ tesserarius,”  an  orderly ; the  other,  “ optio,”  an  adjutant : both  picked  from 
the  ranks  for  special  service. 

tol.  vi. — 20 


306 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  69. 


spiracy  were  here  and  there  escaping ; it  was  only  the  per- 
verse jealousy  of  Laco,  who  refused  to  regard  any  suggestions 
which  had  not  originated  with  himself,  that  prevented  its 
discovery  and  prompt  suppression. 

On  the  morning  of  the  fifteenth,  Galha  was  sacrificing 
before  the  Palatine  temple  of  Apollo,  when  the  aruspex  in- 
formed him  that  the  entrails  were  inauspicious. 

He  is  carried  . 1 

off  to  the  prae-  and  portended  a toe  m his  own  household.  Otho 
onan  camp.  was  standing  by.  He  heard  the  words,  and 
smiled  at  their  import,  which  corresponded  with  his  secret 
designs.  Presently  his  freedman  Onomastus  announced  that 
his  architect  awaited  him  at  home.  The  signal  was  precon- 
certed; it  implied  that  the  soldiers  were  ready,  and  the 
project  ripe.  He  quitted  the  emperor’s  presence  in  haste, 
alleging  that  the  architect  was  come  to  inspect  with  him 
some  new-purchased  premises : leaning  on  his  freedman’s 
arm,  with  the  air  of  a careless  lounger,  he  descended  through 
the  house  of  Tiberius  into  the  Velabrum,  then  turned  to  the 
right  to  the  Golden  Milestone  beneath  the  Capitol  in  front 
of  the  Roman  forum.1  Here  he  was  met  by  some  common 
soldiers,  three  and  twenty  in  number,  who  hailed  him  at 
once  as  imperator,  thrust  him  into  a litter,  and,  with  drawn 
swords,  bore  him  off,  alarmed  as  he  was  at  their  fewness, 
across  the  forum  and  the  Suburra.  Passing  unchallenged 
through  the  wondering  by-standers,  they  reached  the  gates 
of  the  praetorian  camp,  where  guard  was  kept  by  the  tribune 
Martialis,  who,  whether  privy  to  the  plot  or  bewildered  by 
the  suddenness  of  the  crisis,  opened  to  them  without  hesita- 
tion, and  admitted  the  pretender  within  the  enclosure. 

Meanwhile  Galba  was  still  sacrificing,  importuning  the 
gods  of  an  empire  no  longer  his , when  the  report  arrived 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  27.  The  “ house  of  Tiberius  ” was  the  first  imperial  addition 
to  the  original  mansion  of  Augustus  on  the  Palatine.  It  extended  along  the 
western  side  of  the  hill  above  the  Velabrum.  This  passage  shows  that,  as  has 
been  before  suggested,  there  were  common  thoroughfares  through  the  courts  of 
the  palace. 


A.U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


307 


that  some  senator,  his  name  unknown,  was  being 

7 0 Galba  is  de- 

hurried  to  the  camp : 1 a second  messenger  an-  serted  by  the 

. soldiers. 

nounced  that  it  was  Otho:  this  man  was  loi- 
lowed  by  a crowd  of  all  ranks  and  orders,  breathlessly  vocif- 
erating what  they  had  seen  or  heard ; but  still  some  extenu- 
ating, like  courtiers,  the  real  magnitude  of  the  danger.  One 
cohort  of  the  guard  was  stationed  at  the  palace  gates.  It 
was  judged  expedient  to  ascertain  first  the  temper  of  this 
battalion ; but  Galba  was  advised  to  keep  out  of  sight  and 
reserve  his  authority  to  the  last,  while  Piso  went  forth  to 
address  it.  The  soldiers  listened  respectfully,  and  stood  to 
their  arms,  with  the  instinct  of  discipline ; but  there  was  no 
clamour,  no  enthusiasm  among  them.  Officers  were  sent  in 
haste  to  secure  a corps  of  the  Illyrian  army,  which  bivouacked 
in  the  portico  of  Agrippa ; but  they  were  ill-received,  and 
even  thrust  back  with  violence.  Others  again  sought  to 
gain  the  Germanic  cohorts,  drafted  from  their  legions  by 
Nero  for  service  in  the  East,  and  recently  recalled  precipi- 
tately from  Alexandria.  These  men  were  better  disposed 
towards  Galba,  on  account  of  the  care  he  had  bestowed  on 
them  after  their  harassing  voyage ; nevertheless  they  hesi- 
tated to  arm,  and  maintained  an  ominous  silence.  None 
ventured  to  try  the  disposition  of  the  marine  battalions,  still 
resenting  the  slaughter  of  their  comrades ; and  when  three 
bold  tribunes  went  resolutely  to  the  camp  of  the  praetorians, 
to  dissuade  them  from  their  threatened  mutiny,  they  were 
repelled  with  curses,  and  one  of  them  disarmed  by  force. 
The  imperator  was  deserted  by  his  soldiers ; but  the  populace 
rushed  tumultuously  into  the  palace,  demanding  the  death 
of  Otho,  and  the  destruction  of  his  associates,  in  the  same 
tone  of  ferocious  levity  with  which  they  would  have  called 
for  the  gladiators  or  the  lions  in  the  circus.  Galba  could 
derive  no  confidence  from  this  empty  clamour;  as  an  old 
soldier  he  despised  the  nerveless  mob  of  the  streets ; he  still 
debated  with  Yinius  and  others  whether  to  keep  within 

1 Tac.  Hist  L 29. : “ Ignarus  interim  Galba  et  sacris  intentus  fatigabat  alieni 
jam  imperii  Deos.” 


308 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


doors,  guarding  the  approaches,  and  give  the  traitors  time  to 
return  to  a better  mind,  or  go  forth  at  once  to  meet  them, 
and  quell  the  mutiny  with  a word  and  frown,  or  perish  in 
arms  as  became  a Roman  general.1 

Yinius  urged  the  former  course ; Laco,  as  usual,  opposed 
him;  but  assuredly  Laco’s  counsel  was  the  worthiest,  and 
He  goes  forth  might  well  be  deemed  the  safest.  Galba,  always 
to°meetthemu-  ^ would  seem  irresolute,  turned  wistfully  from 
tineers.  one  to  the  other,  but  the  soldier’s  spirit  prevailed, 

and  he  determined  to  act.  He  allowed  Piso,  however,  to 
precede  him  to  the  camp.  Scarce  had  the  younger  Caesar 
gone  than  a report  was  circulated  that  Otho  had  been  slain 
by  the  praetorians.  All  doubted;  many  disbelieved;  pres- 
ently men  were  heard  to  vouch  strongly  for  the  fact ; they 
had  seen  it  with  their  own  eyes.  The  report  was  false,  and 
possibly  it  was  spread  and  confirmed  by  the  usurper’s  adher- 
ents to  draw  the  emperor  from  his  palace  walls,  and  betray 
him  into  the  midst  of  his  enemies.  The  artifice,  if  such  it 
was,  succeeded.  Knights,  senators,  and  people  crowded 
round  Galba,  loudly  murmuring  at  the  disappointment  of 
their  revenge,  and  calling  upon  him  to  issue  from  the  gates, 
and  extinguish  the  last  sparks  of  treason  by  his  presence. 
Arrayed  in  a light  quilted  tunic,  not  in  steel,  and  obliged  by 
age  and  weakness  to  adopt  the  conveyance  of  a litter,  Galba 
put  himself  at  the  head  of  the  surging  multitude.3  Oiie  of 
the  guards  forced  himself  into  his  presence,  and,  waving  a 
bloody  sword,  exclaimed  that  he  had  killed  Otho.  Com - 

rade , said  he,  who  ordered  you  f a touching  rebuke  which 
thrilled  the  hearts  of  the  noblest  of  the  citizens,  and  was 
long  treasured  in  their  memory  as  the  true  eloquence  of  an 
imperator.8 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  31,  32. 

2 Suet.  Galb.  19. : “Loricam  tamen  induit  linteam,  quanquam  haud  dissim- 
ulans  parum  adversus  tot  mucrones  profuturam.” 

3 Tac.  Hist.  i.  35. : “ Commilito,  inquit,  quis  jussit  ? ” The  incident  is  men- 
tioned also  by  Suetonius,  Plutarch,  and  Dion.  It  will  be  remembered  that  Au- 
gustus, tiie  princeps  and  the  tribune,  shrank  from  calling  the  soldiers  his  “ com- 
rades.” 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


309 


By  this  time  the  revolt  had  gathered  head  within  the 
camp.  The  movement  was  confined  to  the  private  soldiers ; 
so,  at  least,  we  are  assured ; and  it  is  almost  af- 

. _ . Otho  proclaim- 

iectmg  to  remark  the  anxiety  oi  the  patriotic  ed  emperor  in 
historian  to  explain  that  the  first  instance  of  sue-  ecamp- 
cessful  mutiny  at  Rome  was  the  work  of  the  common  herd, 
and  in  no  sense  that  of  their  officers.  Tribunes  and  centu- 
rions were  disarmed,  or  kept  aloof,  while  the  crowd,  without 
leaders  and  without  order,  moved  by  the  common  instinct 
of  turbulent  disaffection,  thrust  Otho  between  their  stand- 
ards fixed  around  the  tribunal,  on  the  very  spot  where  a 
gilded  image  of  Galba  might  remind  them  of  the  oath  which 
bound  them  to  his  person.  Otho  himself,  no  longer  his  own 
master,  hardly  conscious  perhaps  of  his  position,  stretched 
forth  his  arms  to  the  right  and  left,  kissing  his  hands  towards 
the  crowd,  wherever  the  loudest  shout  resounded,  courting 
empire , says  Tacitus,  with  the  demeanour  of  a slave.1  He 
writhed  under  his  ignominy  as  the  puppet  of  a mob,  and 
hesitated  to  assume  the  tone  of  command;  but  when  the 
marine  battalions  advanced  in  a body,  and  swore  fidelity  to 
his  orders,  he  felt  himself  at  last  an  imperator,  and  addressed 
his  partisans  with  the  spirit  and  self-possession  of  their  legit- 
imate chief.  The  ceremony  of  installation  was  complete. 
Otho  commanded  the  armouries  to  be  opened,  and  the  men 
rushed,  prtetorians  and  legionaries,  Romans  and  auxiliaries, 
all  mingled  together,  and  seized  the  first  weapons  that  came 
to  hand,  without  distinction  of  rank  or  post  in  the  service. 

The  buzz  of  movement  to  and  fro,  and  the  discordant  cries 
of  the  soldiers,  penetrated  from  the  camp  into  the  city,  and 
Piso,  checking  his  first  impulse  to  confront  the 

. . ® r ...  Galba  and  Piso 

mutineers  in  person,  awaited  Galba  s arrival  in  halt  in  the  fo- 
the  forum,  and  took  his  own  place  in  the  emperor’s 
escort.  The  accounts  now  grew  momentarily  worse  and 
worse ; the  old  man  seems  to  have  lost  his  presence  of  mind, 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  36. : “ Omnia  serviliter  pro  dominatione.”  According  to 
Suetonius  (Otho,  6.),  he  said  that  he  would  accept  only  just  as  much  power  as 
they  chose  to  leave  him : “ Id  demum  se  habiturum  quod  ipsi  sibi  reliquissent.” 


310 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


and  allowed  his  followers  to  urge  on  him  their  timid  and 
conflicting  counsels,  to  return  to  the  palace,  to  repair  to  the 
Capitol,  to  occupy  the  rostra.  Laco  would  have  seized  the 
opportunity  to  wreak  his  private  grudge  by  ordering  the 
assassination  of  Yinius,  under  pretence  that  he  was  a friend 
of  Otho,  and  a traitor  to  the  emperor ; but  Yinius  was  on 
his  guard,  the  moment  passed,  and  Galba  was  still  surrounded 
by  the  whole  body  of  his  friends,  whose  only  hope  now  lay 
in  a spontaneous  rising  of  the  people  against  the  soldiery. 

The  mutual  jealousy,  indeed,  which  had  long  subsisted 
between  these  two  classes  might  still  have  changed  the  as- 
pect of  affairs.  The  urban  populace  hated  the 

Otho  advances  . , , , n 

at  the  head  of  soldiery,  with  whom  they  had  no  tamily  ties,  and 

the  soldiers.  n •>  , . ,. 

so  many  ot  whom  they  now  saw  thronging  their 
streets  as  the  favourites  of  the  Csesar,  and  gifted  with  privi- 
leges which  encroached  upon  their  comforts  and  galled  their 
pride.  At  this  moment  all  the  populace  were  in  the  streets, 
or  filled  the  basilicas  and  temples;  their  eyes  turned  in 
amazement  from  side  to  side,  their  ears  caught  at  every 
sound;  alarmed  and  indignant,  they  awaited  the  event  in 
silence.1  With  nobles  for  their  leaders,  and  armed  retainers 
of  the  nobles  to  support  them,  they  might  have  proved  not 
unequal  to  a conflict  even  with  the  trained  swordsmen  of  the 
legions.  And  Otho  was  assured  that  they  were  arming. 
No  time  was  to  be  lost.  With  colours  flying  and  martial 
music,  with  measured  step  and  naked  weapons,  advanced  the 
battalions  under  his  direction  to  the  capture  of  the  city  and 
the  overthrow  of  the  laws. 

A single  cohort  still  surrounded  Galba,  when,  at  the  sight 
of  these  advancing  columns,  its  standard-bearer  tore  the  em- 
peror’s image  from  his  spear-head,  and  dashed  it 

Assassination  A ° 1 

of  Galba,  foi-  on  the  ground.  1 he  soldiers  were  at  once  decid- 
of  vinius  and  ed  for  Otho:  swords  were  drawn,  and  every 
symptom  of  favour  for  Galba  among  the  by- 
standers was  repressed  by  menaces,  till  they  dispersed  and 


Tac.  Hist.  i.  40. : “ Quale  magni  metus  et  magnee  irae  silentium  est.” 


A.  U.  822. J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


311 


fled  in  horror  from  the  forum.  At  last  the  bearers  of  the 
emperor’s  litter  overturned  it  at  the  Curtian  pool  beneath 
the  Capitol.  In  a moment  enemies  swarmed  around  his 
body.  A few  words  he  muttered,  which  have  been  diversely 
reported  : some  said  that  they  were  abject  and  unbecoming ; 
others  affirmed  that  he  presented  his  neck  to  the  assassin’s 
sword,  and  bade  him  strike,  if  it  were  good  for  the  republic  : 
but  none  listened,  none  perhaps  heeded  the  words  actually 
spoken ; Galba’s  throat  was  pierced,  but  even  the  author  of 
his  mortal  wound  was  not  ascertained,  while,  his  breast  be- 
ing protected  by  the  cuirass,  his  legs  and  arms  were  hacked 
with  repeated  gashes.  The  murder  of  Galba  was  followed 
by  that  of  Vinius,  who  was  said  to  have  in  vain  exclaimed 
that  Otho  could  have  no  interest  in  his  death : but  there 
was  evidently  among  the  Romans  a deep  dislike  to  this  man, 
and  they  were  prone  to  believe  in  his  treachery.  Lastly, 
the  noble  Piso  was  attacked,  and  though,  protected  for  a 
moment  by  the  devotion  of  a centurion,  whose  fidelity  is  the 
only  bright  spot  in  this  day  of  horrors,  he  made  his  way 
into  the  temple  of  Yesta,  the  goddess  could  offer  no  secure 
asylum ; he  was  dragged  forth  by  the  instruments  of  Otho, 
under  special  orders  to  hunt  him  out  and  despatch  him.  The 
heads  of  all  the  three  were  brought  to  the  victor  of  the  day, 
and  while  he  gazed  with  emotions  of  respect  on  Galba’s, 
with  some  pity  on  that  of  Yinius,  Piso’s,  it  is  said,  he  re- 
garded with  barbarous  and  unmanly  satisfaction.  These 
bloody  trophies  were  then  paraded  through  the  streets  by 
the  brutal  soldiers,  many  of  whom  thrust  their  reeking  hands 
above  the  crowd,  swearing  that  they  had  struck  the  first,  the 
second,  the  tenth,  or  the  twentieth  blow ; and  when  the  dis- 
tribution of  rewards  arrived,  not  less,  we  are  assured,  than  a 
hundred  and  twenty  .claims  were  presented  to  the  govern- 
ment from  the  pretended  authors  of  the  most  notable  feats 
of  arms.1  These  ferocious  soldiers  were  fully  alive  to  their 

1 Plutarch,  who  treats  the  story  of  Galba  throughout  with  strange  indiffer- 
ence, and  almost  levity,  applies  here  a line  from  Archilochus  (c.  27. ) : 


312 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


political  importance,  and  determined  to  insist  upon  it.  The 
praetorians  demanded  the  right  of  choosing  their  own  pre- 
fects, and  appointed  Plotius  Firmus  and  Licinius  Proculus, 
while  Flavius  Sabinus,  the  elder  brother  of  Yespasian,  was 
nominated  warden  of  the  city.1 

From  our  slender  accounts  of  the  emperor  whose  brief 
reign  and  sudden  fall  have  been  just  related,  we  may  con- 
Gaiba  a sped-  ceive  him  a fine  specimen  of  the  soldier-nobles  of 
dier-nobie^f01"  time,  undoubtedly  the  finest  class  of  Roman 
Home.  citizens.  The  men  who  governed  the  provinces, 

nobles  by  birth,  senators  in  rank,  judges  and  administrators 
as  well  as  captains  by  office,  represent  the  highest  and  largest 
training  of  the  Roman  character ; for  they  combined  a wide 
experience  of  men  and  affairs  with  the  feelings  of  a high-born 
aristocracy,  and  the  education  of  polished  gentlemen.  Long 
removed  from  daily  intercourse  with  their  more  frivolous 
peers  in  the  city,  they  escaped  for  the  most  part  contamin- 
ation with  the  worst  elements  of  society  at  home ; they  re- 
tained some  of  the  purity  together  with  the  vigour  of  the 
heroes  of  the  republic ; they  preserved  in  an  era  of  ideologists 
or  sensualists  the  strength  of  character  and  manly  principle 
which  had  laid  the  deep  foundations  of  the  Roman  empire. 
They  were  conquerors,  but  they  were  also  organizers  ; and 
so  far,  with  respect  at  least  to  subjects  of  inferior  race,  they 
deserve  to  be  reputed  civilizers.  They  impressed  on  the 
mind  of  the  Orientals  a fear,  upon  that  of  the  Occidentals  an 
admiration,  of  Rome,  which  taught  them  first  to  acquiesce  in 
the  yoke,  and  afterwards  to  glory  in  it.  These  were  the 
representatives  of  her  moral  power  of  whom  Rome  should 

EKTa  yap  venpuv  Trapdvruv,  ovc  epdp'ipa/iev  nod, 

X&loi  tyovfjtq  kcpev. 

The  body  of  Galba  was  consumed  privately  by  one  of  his  freedmen,  named 
Argius, — it  is  pleasing  to  record  these  traits  of  class-attachment, — and  the 
ashes  laid  in  his  family  sepulchre.  His  villa  stood  on  the  Janiculum,  and  his 
remains  are  said  to  repose  in  the  gardens  of  the  Villa  Pamphili.  Ampere, 
Hist.  Bom.  d Borne , § 4. 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  41-46. ; Suet.  Galb.  20. ; Dion,  lxiv.  6. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


313 


have  made  her  idols,  alike  for  the  glory  of  their  exploits  and 
the  influence  of  their  will  and  character ; — not  the  Claudii 
and  Domitii,  whom  the  chance  of  family  adoption  had  raised 
to  the  lip-worship  of  courtiers  and  time-servers.  We  are 
tempted  to  gaze  again  and  again,  in  the  decline  and  decay 
before  us,  on  the  legitimate  succession  of  true  Roman  no- 
bility, to  renew  our  admiration  of  its  sense  of  duty,  its  devo- 
tion to  principles  of  obedience  and  self-control,  unshaken  by 
the  cavils  of  the  schools,  serving  the  emperor  as  the  Genius 
of  Discipline,  worshipping  all  the  gods  after  the  custom  of 
antiquity,  but  trusting  no  god  but  its  country. 

The  Romans  considered  Galba  to  have  lost  the  empire  by 
mismanagement.  After  summing  up  his  qualities, — his  de- 
sire for  fame,  but  dignified  reserve  in  awaiting  Galba  a good 
rather  than  seeking  it,  his  abstinence  from  extor-  JotTglod  Ora- 
tion, his  private  frugality,  his  public  parsimony,  peror- 
the  moderation  of  his  passions,  the  mediocrity  of  his  genius, 
the  slowness  and  discretion  of  his  conduct,  which  passed 
with  many  for  wisdom,  finally  his  freedom  from  vices  rather 
than  possession  of  virtues, — Tacitus,  speaking  solemnly  in 
the  name  of  his  countrymen,  declares  that  all  men  would 
have  pronounced  him  fit  to  bear  rule  at  Rome,  had  he  but 
never  ruled.1  Such  a judgment  it  is  impossible  for  us  now 
to  question ; nevertheless,  there  seems  nothing  to  be  said,  as 
far  as  our  evidence  goes,  against  his  administration,  except 
his  fatal  stiffness  with  regard  to  the  expected  donative.  The 
great  act  of  his  short  reign,  the  appointment  of  an  associate, 
was  apparently  as  wise  as  magnanimous,  and  the  choice, 
itself  probably  judicious,  was  certainly  determined  by  no 
unworthy  motive.  It  is  true,  however,  that  the  character  of 
the  legionary  chief  was  generally  little  fitted  for  rule  in  the 
city.  The  camp  officers  were  rarely  men  of  liberal  minds  or 
elevated  views  : though  the  control  of  a province  might  seem, 
at  first  sight,  a proper  introduction  to  the  government  of  an 
empire,  it  must  never  be  forgotten  that  the  province  was  no 


1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  49. : “ Omnium  consensu  capax  Imperii  nisi  imperasset.’ 


314 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROAIANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


more  than  a camp  to  the  proconsul,  and  that  he  seldom 
stepped,  in  his  administration  of  it,  beyond  the  curt  and 
rigid  forms  of  military  law.  Though  these  stern  soldiers 
were  deeply  imbued  with  respect  for  the  name  of  the  senate 
at  a distance,  they  were  not  likely  to  restrain  their  wills  in 
deference  to  it,  when  actually  face  to  face.  And  accordingly 
we  find  that  Galba,  when  he  appointed  Piso  his  colleague, 
sought  the  ratification  of  his  act  in  the  first  instance,  not 
from  the  senate,  but  from  the  soldiers.  And  if  we  lament,  in 
him,  an  indecision  at  the  most  trying  moments,  such  as  we 
should  not  expect  in  one  accustomed  to  command,  we  may 
ascribe  it  less  to  natural  infirmity  of  character,  or  the  timid- 
ity of  old  age,  than  to  a rising  consciousness  that,  with  every 
qualification  for  governing  a province,  he  was  unequal  to  the 
burden  of  empire.1 

Nevertheless,  no  small  proportion  at  this  time  of  the 
citizens  in  the  toga,  and  all  the  citizens  under  arms,  were 
^ , fully  convinced  that  a chief  of  the  legions  was 

enedimme-  quite  fit  to  be  an  emperor.  We  have  seen  how 

diately  with  a 

rival  in  Vitei-  many  pretenders  to  the  purple  started  up  at  the 
moment  when  the  world  abandoned  Nero.  One 
after  another  the  star  of  Galba  had  extinguished  these  lesser 
luminaries ; but  new  competitors  for  poAver  were  ready  to 
take  their  place,  and  had  his  short  career  been  but  a little 
protracted,  Galba  too  would  soon  have  been  required  to 
come  forth  and  defend  his  power  by  arms.  The  next  change 
in  the  succession  served  only  to  strengthen  this  necessity. 
From  the  moment  that  he  stepped  through  an  emperor’s 
blood  into  the  palace  of  the  Caesars,  Otho  was  made  aware 

1 Suetonius,  who  describes  Galba’s  figure  with  his  usual  minuteness, — 
“ Statura  fuit  justa,  capite  prascalvo,  oculis  caeruleis,  adunco  naso,” — adds  that 
his  feet  and  hands  were  so  much  distorted  by  gout,  that  he  could  neither  wear 
shoes  nor  unroll  a volume.  He  was  also  disfigured  and  incommoded  by  a large 
wen  on  his  right  side.  At  the  same  time  he  boasted  of  his  health  and  strength : 
eti  fioc  fievbg  ejmedov  ectiv , he  had  said,  only  a few  days  before  his  death.  Galb. 
20,  21.  C.  Galba,  the  emperor’s  father,  was  deformed.  See  the  jokes  upon  him 
by  Augustus  and  others  in  Macrob.  Saturn,  ii.  4.  6. : “Ego  te  monere  possum, 
corrigere  non  possum.”  “ Ingenium  Galbse  male  habitat.” 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


315 


that  he  in  his  turn  must  fight  if  he  would  retain  his  newly 
acquired  honours.  It  was  in  vain  that  the  senate  prostrated 
itself  obsequiously  before  the  murderer  of  its  late  champion, 
accepted  him  as  emperor,  and  heaped  upon  him  all  the  titles 
and  functions  of  the  sovereign  power.1  He  turned  with 
bitter  contempt  from  the  vile  flatteries  of  the  populace,  and 
the  acclamations  with  which  they  greeted  him  by  the  name 
of  Otho-Nero,  as  if  they  anticipated  from  his  accession  only 
a renewal  of  the  orgies  of  the  circus  and  the  theatres,  to  the 
heralds  who  followed  one  another  in  quick  succession,  bring- 
ing him  accounts  of  the  progress  of  sedition  in  Gaul,  and  the 
formidable  attitude  assumed  by  Yitellius,  at  the  head  of  the 
armies  of  the  Rhine.2  The  temper  of  this  upstart,  the  dissolute 
son  of  one  of  the  most  profligate  courtiers  of  the  late  reigns, 
was  unfavourably  known  at  Rome,  and  the  prospect  of  a 
civil  war,  from  which  Galba’s  good  fortune  had  saved  the 
state,  was  aggravated  by  the  personal  defects  of  both  com- 
petitors. Already  the  best  and  wisest  of  the  The  best  dti- 
citizens  looked  elsewhere  for  the  saviour  of  the  ^Vespa- 
commonwealth,  and  augured  from  the  vigour  sian- 
and  discretion  of  Vespasian,  then  commanding  in  Palestine, 
that  he  would  be  the  fittest  man  to  step  in  between  them, 
and  wrest  the  prize  from  both.3 

Aulus  Vitellius,  whose  father  Lucius  had  been  censor  with 
Claudius,  and  thrice  consul,  was  born  in  768,  and  was  now 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  47. : “ Accurrunt  patres,  decernitur  Othoni  tribunitia  potes- 
tas,  et  nomen  Augusti,  et  omnes  principum  honores.” 

2 It  was  to  humour  the  populace,  we  may  believe,  that  Otho  himself,  if  we 
are  to  credit  Suetonius  and  Plutarch,  assumed,  in  some  of  his  despatches,  the 
odious  name  of  Nero,  and  ordered  the  tyrant’s  statues  to  be  restored.  Tacitus 
only  mentions  that  he  was  “ supposed  to  have  contemplated  ” celebrating  the 
memory  of  Nero,  and  that  some  persons  took  upon  themselves  to  re-erect  his 
statutes.  Otho  contented  himself  with  paying  that  honour  to  Poppsea,  of  whom 
he  seems  to  have  been  passionately  enamoured.  He  contemplated  also  marry- 
ing Statilia,  the  relict  of  his  predecessor,  no  doubt  to  strengthen  his  title  in  the 
estimation  of  the  populace.  Suet.  Otho , 10. 

3 Tac.  Hist.  i.  50. 


316 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


The  character  accordingly  in  his  55th  year,  older  by  seventeen 
of  Viteihus.  years  than  his  rival  Otho.  His  early  intimacy 
with  Tiberius  at  Caprete  had  obtained  for  him  a scandalous 
notoriety ; he  humoured  with  equal  compliance  the  follies 
of  succeeding  Caesars,  and  drove  the  chariot  in  the  circus 
with  Caius,  or  played  dice  with  Claudius.  Hero’s  favour  he 
gained  by  his  adroitness  in  combating  the  young  prince’s 
coyness,  and  insisting  on  his  coming  forward  to  play  and 
sing  at  a public  festival,  nevertheless,  this  unscrupulous 
courtier  had  not  wholly  abandoned  himself  to  the  vices  and 
pleasures  of  the  city.  He  had  obtained  some  reputation  in 
rhetoric  and  letters,  and,  moreover,  he  had  served  as  pro- 
consul,  and  again  as  legatus  in  Africa,  where  he  had  acquired 
a reputation  for  uprightness.1 2  At  Rome,  however,  he  had 
given  the  rein  to  his  cupidity,  or,  possibly,  the  public  voice 
was  there  more  addicted  to  calumny.  It  was  whispered  that 
he  had  robbed  some  temples  of  their  golden  ornaments,  and 
replaced  them  with  baser  metal.  But  his  profusion,  we  are 
assured,  was  at  least  equal  to  his  avarice,  and  when  Galba 
chose  him  for  command  in  Germany,  his  resources  were  so 
exhausted  that  he  was  obliged  to  leave  his  wife  and  children 
in  a hired  lodging,  while  he  let  his  own  handsome  mansion 
to  strangers.  The  Romans  were  astonished,  it  is  said,  at  the 
selection,  for  at  the  moment  the  post  was  of  more  than  ordi- 
nary importance.  They  surmised  that  he  had  found  a 
powerful  friend  in  Yinius,  attached  to  him  by  their  common 
interest  in  the  Blue  faction  of  the  circus ; or  insinuated  that 
with  the  jealous  emperor  his  bad  character  was  itself  a 
merit.8 

The  combat  between  the  troops  of  Yindex  and  Yirginius 

1 Suet.  Vitell.  3-5. : “ Singularem  innocentiam  praestitit.”  Such  testimony 
in  favour  of  a man  who  has  received  no  quarter  from  ordinary  history,  ought  to 
be  specified.  Yet  it  is  open  to  us  to  inquire  whether  the  “ innocence  ” here 
signalized  implies  equity  and  moderation  towards  the  provincials,  or  indulgence 
and  popular  manners  in  connexion  with  Roman  officials,  the  quaestors,  and  pro- 
consular staff. 

2 Suet.  Vitell.  3-7. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


317 


had  left  deep  bitterness  behind,  though  the  one  chief  was 
dead,  and  the  other  had  relinquished  his  com-  yiteiiius  is  m- 
mand.  The  victorious  legions  were  those  of  the  byethe°k|ion9 
German  frontier,  almost  the  remotest  garrisons  in  GauL 
on  the  continent,  and  accordingly  the  furthest  cut  off  from 
the  sympathies  of  Rome  and  Italy.  Few,  indeed,  of  the 
rank  and  file  of  these  armies  were  really  Romans  in  birth ; 
their  cohorts,  originally  levied  within  the  Alps,  had  long 
been  recruited  in  the  provinces  beyond,  and  it  was  by  Gaul- 
ish hands  that  Gaul  was  now  for  the  most  part  defended. 
Still,  even  to  natives  of  Narbo  or  Tolosa,  service  on  the 
Rhine  had  been  a distant  exile ; they  had  long  sighed  to 
exchange  the  winters  of  the  North  for  the  sunny  climes,  not 
yet  forgotten,  of  their  birth ; while  even  the  land  of  the  Se- 
quani  or  the  HSdui,  on  which  they  had  fought  and  conquered 
the  battalions  of  Yindex,  they  regarded  as  foreign  and  hos- 
tile, and  looked  wistfully  on  its  wealth  as  the  legitimate  re- 
ward of  their  victory.  Between  these  regions  and  Italy  lay 
the  Claudian  colony  of  Lugdunum,  the  inhabitants  of  which 
were  devoted  to  the  name  of  their  patron  Nero,  and  jealous 
of  the  rival  strongholds  of  Augustodunum  and  Yesontio, 
recently  favoured  by  Galba  with  a remission  of  tribute. 
Every  rumour  from  Rome  passed  through  their  city,  and 
they  made  use  of  their  position  to  embitter,  by  fiction  or 
misrepresentation,  the  feud  between  the  legions,  and  foster 
jealous  feelings  towards  the  emperor  of  the  senate.1  Yitei- 
iius, as  we  have  seen,  was  sent  by  Galba  to  command  the 
army  of  Lower  Germany.  He  had  reached  its  quarters  at 
the  beginning  of  December.  His  mission  really  was  to 
soothe  rather  than  punish,  and,  instead  of  the  dismissal  of 
centurions  and  decimation  of  manipulars,  with  which  the 
Lyonnese  had  threatened  them,  the  soldiers  found,  to  their 
surprise,  that  punishments  were  remitted,  honours  distribut- 
ed, and  the  ill-treatment  they  had  suffered  through  the  av- 
arice and  injustice  of  their  late  chief  alleviated.  Thus  far 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  51. : “Infensa  Lugdunensis  colonia  et  pertinaci  pro  Nerone 
fide,  foecunda  rumoribus.” 


318 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


Vitellius,  we  may  suppose,  carried  out  the  instructions  fur- 
nished him  by  Galba ; but  the  profuseness  of  his  liberality, 
with  borrowed  funds,  seemed  to  betoken  already  ulterior 
designs,  and  he  soon  lent  an  ear  to  the  suggestions  of  Al- 
lienus  Caecina  and  Fabius  Valens,  legates  of  two  legions  on 
the  Rhine,  who  urged  him  to  put  himself  at  the  head  of  a 
general  insurrection.  They  flattered  him  with  the  assurance 
of  the  regard  in  which  he  was  held  by  the  soldiers,  the  pro- 
vincials, and  the  citizens  of  Gaul ; promised  him  the  aid  of 
Hordeonius  with  the  troops  of  Upper  Germany ; persuaded 
him  that  the  garrisons  of  Britain  would  cross  the  sea  to  join 
or  follow  him,  that  the  subjects  of  Rome,  far  and  wide,  were 
ripe  for  revolt  against  the  senate,  that  the  empire  that  feeble 
body  had  ventured  to  confer  was  a shadow  which  would 
vanish  in  the  first  flash  of  his  weapons.  It  was  well,  they 
added,  for  Yirginius  to  hesitate.  His  origin  was  obscure  ; 
his  father  was  a simple  knight ; and  he  might  safely  decline 
the  imperium  he  could  not  securely  wield.  With  Vitellius 
it  was  otherwise ; his  birth  was  noble,  his  father  had  been 
censor  and  thrice  consul ; his  rank  made  a private  station 
dangerous,  but  was  not  unworthy  of  the  highest  elevation.1 
To  a man  who  had  once  admitted  the  idea  of  treason  this 
reasoning  was  not  without  its  weight.  That  it  had  been 
used  to  him  at  all  made  him  an  object  of  suspicion,  and  to 
be  suspected,  as  the  parasite  of  four  Caesars  well  knew,  was 
a sure  presage  of  disgrace. 

The  two  officers  above  mentioned  will  play  a considerable 
part  in  the  events  which  are  to  follow.  Of  Caecina’s  previous 
historv  we  only  know  that  Galba  had  advanced 

Caecina  and  Va-  J J . 

lens,  partisans  him,  as  a zealous  partisan,  irom  the  quaestorship 
in  Baetica  to  the  command  of  a legion  in  Upper 

1 The  genealogists  had  kept  pace  with  the  ascent  of  the  Yitellii,  and  had 
already  traced  them  from  Faunus,  the  legendary  king  of  the  Aborigines,  and 
Vitellia,  a Sabine  divinity.  Their  historic  celebrity,  however,  did  not  date  be- 
yond P.  Yitellius,  born  at  Nuceria,  a Roman  knight,  procurator  of  Augustus, 
who  left  four  sons,  all  of  whom  became  magistrates  and  senators.  Suet.  Vilell. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


319 


Germany,  but  he  had  incurred  the  emperor’s  displeasure,  and 
been  subjected  to  a prosecution  for  embezzlement.  The 
crimes  of  Yalens  had  been  more  daring.  At  the  head  of  the 
First  legion  in  Lower  Germany  he  had  urged  Virginius  to 
assume  the  purple,  and  on  his  refusal  had  pretended  to  dis- 
close his  intrigues  to  Galba.  By  him  the  death  of  Fonteius 
had  been  effected ; and,  though  Galba  had  been  assured  that 
Fonteius  was  a traitor,  many  believed  that  this  charge  also 
had  been  forged  by  Yalens,  as  an  excuse  for  ridding  himself 
of  a man  who,  like  Yirginius,  had  declined  his  treasonable 
suggestions.  Yalens  now  complained  that  his  merits  were 
not  duly  rewarded,  and  the  arrival  of  the  weak  and  vain 
Yitellius  seemed  to  offer  another  opportunity  of  pushing  for- 
ward a candidate  for  the  purple,  behind  whose  cloak  he 
might  himself  rise  to  honours.  For  it  was  one  of  the  most 
fatal  symptoms  of  national  decline,  that  unlawful  ambition 
was  not  confined  to  the  highest  object,  but  that  ofiicers,  far 
too  low  in  rank  and  dignity  to  aspire  to  empire  themselves, 
were  eager  to  thrust  it  upon  others  for  the  lesser  rewards  of 
a subordinate.1 

Yitellius  still  hesitated : his  ideas  were  slow,  and  his 
spirit  not  equal  to  the  conception  of  a great  design.  He  was 
more  intent  on  sensual  gratifications  than  the 

. _ _ . . _ . ...  Vitellius  pro- 

prosecution  oi  a higher  though  more  criminal  claimed  em- 
ambition.  But  meanwhile  the  murmurs  of  the  Germanic  ie- 
soldiers  were  increasing,  and  the  Treviri  and  gl°ns' 
Lingones,  the  most  powerful  of  the  states  near  which  they 
were  quartered,  resenting  the  penalties  Galba  had  inflicted 
on  them  for  their  leaning  to  the  side  of  Nero,  fanned  the 
flame  of  discontent.  When,  on  the  first  of  January,  the 
men  were  drawn  up  to  take  the  oath  to  the  emperor,  the 
legions  of  the  Lower  province  performed  their  duty  coldly 
and  reluctantly,  but  those  of  the  Upper  absolutely  refused 
to  repeat  the  words  of  their  tribunes,  tore  down  the  images 
of  Galba,  and  trampled  them  under  foot.  Yet  such  was  still 


Tac.  Hist.  i.  52,  53. 


320 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


their  sense  of  discipline  that  they  insisted  on  the  oath  being 
administered  to  them  in  the  names  of  the  Senate  and  People , 
according  to  the  usage  of  the  republic.1 2  The  determination 
of  the  soldiers  was  irresistible.  Four  only  of  the  centurions 
of  the  Eighteenth  legion  made  an  effort  to  save  Galba’s  im- 
ages,  and  they  were  seized  and  thrown  into  chains ; while 
Hordeonius  looked  on  without  attempting  to  enforce  his 
authority.  The  standard-bearer  of  the  Fourth  legion,  which 
also  belonged  to  the  Upper  province,  was  sent  to  Colonia 
Agrippina,  and  brought  the  news  to  Yitellius  the  next  night 
at  supper,  of  the  defection  of  the  whole  Upper  army  from 
Galba.  They  were  ready  to  serve  the  Senate  and  People, 
but  they  demanded  another  Imperator.  The  moment  for 
decision  had  arrived.  The  advisers  of  Yitellius  were  prompt 
and  clamorous,  and  he  yielded  almost  passively  to  their  in- 
stances. Presented  as  their  leader,  he  was  accepted  with 
acclamations : his  name  was  passed  from  mouth  to  mouth, 
while  those  of  Senate  and  People  ceased  to  be  repeated  at  all.3 
The  whole  of  the  legions  on  the  frontier  combined  in  open 
revolt  against  the  faction  of  Galba,  and  were  supported  by 
the  resources,  freely  tendered,  of  the  province  behind  them. 

A military  revolution  had  commenced.  Yitellius  was  the 
emperor  of  the  army.  In  assigning  the  offices  of  the  impe- 
rial household,  it  was  from  the  army  alone  that 

Vitellius,  with  ’ J 

the  main  body  he  made  his  appointments.  His  stewards,  secre- 
prepares  to  tanes,  and  chamberlains,  the  most  confidential 
ward  in  three  of  his  ministers,  were  chosen,  not  from  the  freed- 

men  of  his  family,  but  from  Roman  knights,  offi- 
cers of  the  prtetorium ; privates  received  money  from  the 
fiscus  to  buy  their  indulgences  from  the  centurions.3  The 
ferocity  with  which  they  demanded  the  punishment  of  the 
most  obnoxious  officers  was  approved  and  gratified,  and  the 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  55. : “ Ac  ne  reverentiam  imperii  exuere  viderentur,  Senatua 
populique  Rom.  obliterata  jam  nomina  Sacramento  advocabant.” 

2 Tac.  Hist.  i.  56,  57. 

3 Tac.  Hist.  i.  58. : “Yacationes  centurionibus  ex  fisco  numerat.”  Comp. 
Ann.  i.  17. : “ Hinc  saevitiam  centurionum  et  yacationes  munerum  redimi.” 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


321 


vengeance  they  solicited  for  the  death  of  Fonteins  was  only 
half  eluded  by  the  substitution  of  a centurion  who  struck 
the  blow  for  the  chief  of  the  galleys  under  whose  orders  he 
had  acted.  The  man  who  was  thus  withdrawn  from  their 
fury  seems  to  have  been  a Gaul  by  birth,  though  his  name, 
Julius  Burdo,  shows  that  he  was  adopted  into  the  gens  of 
the  imperial  family ; and  he  owed  his  life,  it  may  be  pre- 
sumed, to  the  policy  of  Vitellius,  anxious  not  to  offend  the 
provincials,  whose  aid  he  required,  and  by  whom  his  forces 
were  supplied.  On  the  same  account,  no  doubt,  Civilis,  a 
leader  of  Batavian  auxiliaries,  was  snatched  from  the  hands 
of  the  legionaries,  and  the  fidelity  of  the  light  native  cohorts 
he  commanded  as  a separate  corps  was  preserved  to  the 
common  cause.  The  armies  of  the  Rhine  seem  to  have  num- 
bered at  this  time  seven  legions : an  eighth,  the  Italic,  was 
stationed  at  Lugdunum.  The  garrisons  of  Britain  signified 
their  adhesion  to  the  league,  and  contributed  perhaps  some 
battalions  to  the  force  now  preparing  to  descend  upon  Italy. 
But  the  great  interests  of  the  empire  were  still  sacred  in  the 
eyes  of  the  usurper,  and  he  would  not  leave  the  frontiers 
defenceless.  Some  cohorts  were  to  be  left  behind  in  the 
principal  stations,  and  these  reinforced  by  provincial  levies. 
Meanwhile  the  armament  destined  for  the  enterprise  was 
divided  into  three  bodies.  Yalens  was  directed  to  take  the 
route  of  the  Cottian  Alps,  with  the  first,  comprising  some 
chosen  corps  of  the  Lower  army  marshalled  under  the  eagle 
of  the  Fifth  legion,  amounting,  with  numerous  cohorts  of 
allies,  to  forty  thousand  men.  Csecina  undertook  to  pene- 
trate the  Pennine  pass ; and  his  force,  though  nominally  but 
one  legion,  the  Twenty-first,  numbered  thirty  thousand. 
The  main  body,  led  by  Vitellius  himself,  was  to  follow ; and 
this  too  was  amply  supplied  with  battalions  of  German  aux- 
iliaries. These  foreigners  were  among  the  most  devoted  to 
the  new  emperor’s  fortunes.  They  exulted  in  the  title  of 
Germanicus  which  he  was  now  induced  to  assume,  as  chief, 
not  as  conqueror,  of  the  German  people : perhaps  they  were 
the  more  delighted  at  his  refusing  to  accept  the  hostile  ap- 
YOL.  vi. — 21 


322 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


pellation  of  Caesar.1 2  A favourable  omen  contributed  to  raise 
their  spirits.  At  the  moment  when  Yalens  commenced  his 
march  southwards,  an  eagle,  the  bird  of  empire  and  of  Rome, 
soared  above  the  heads  of  the  soldiers,  and,  unmoved  by 
their  cries,  sailed  majestically  before  them,  and  marshalled 
them  the  way  that  they  were  going. 

Treves,  accustomed  to  the  sight  of  the  legions,  received 
the  moving  masses  without  distrust.  Metz,  in  its  terror, 
Vaiens  ad  made  a show  of  opposition,  which  was  expiated 
vances  through  with  blood.  At  Laon  the  news  of  the  death  of 
crosses  the  Galba  caused  no  halt ; but  it  served  to  remove  all 
hesitation  in  the  minds  of  the  provincials,  who, 
while  they  hated  both  Yitellius  and  Otho,  inclined  naturally 
to  him  from  whose  wrath  they  had  most  to  apprehend.  At 
Langres  a corps  of  Batavi,  detached  from  the  Fourteenth 
legion,  showed  some  indisposition  to  join.  They  were  re- 
duced by  force  of  arms,  some  examples  made,  and  the  united 
armament  again  swept  onward.  Autun  was  commanded  to 
furnish  large  supplies ; its  refusal  might  at  least  offer  a plea 
for  plunder ; but  fear  counselled  prompt  obedience.  Lyons 
gave  its  quota  without  reluctance.3  The  Italic  legion  was  here 
required  to  join,  and  a single  cohort  of  the  Eighteenth  was 
left  behind  in  its  place.  Between  Lyons  and  Vienne  existed 
an  ancient  animosity.  Galba  had  recently  mulcted  the  one 
city  and  enriched  the  other.  The  Lyonnese  now  prompted 

1 Tac.  Hist  i.  62.:  “Nomen  Germanici  Vitellio  statim  inditum:  Caesarem 
se  appellari  etiam  victor  prohibuit.”  Suet.  Vitell.  8. 

2 An  apology  is  due,  perhaps,  for  using  the  modern  names  of  these  cities. 
In  writing  the  history  of  the  Romans  in  Gaul  at  this  period  we  have  this 
difficulty,  that  the  old  Gaulish  names  of  the  cities  had  generally  become 
disused,  such  as  Divodurum  (Metz),  while  the  later  apellations,  Medio- 
matrici,  Leuci,  Treviri,  Lingones,  belong  to  neither  ancient  history  nor  modern. 
Tacitus  still  employs  the  circumlocution  civitas  Leucorum,  Lingonum,  &c.  I 
might  write  Augustodunum,  Lugdunum,  or  Vienna,  but  it  seemed  better  to  pre- 
serve uniformity  at  least  on  the  same  page.  It  will  be  observed  that  I generally 
adopt  the  modern  names  of  rivers  rather  than  the  ancient,  because  use  has 

sanctioned  it,  and  in  fact  they  are  in  most  cases  identical  in  origin,  and  only 
vary  in  pronounciation. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


323 


the  Vitellian  soldiers  to  avenge  their  injuries  on  their  more 
favoured  neighbours.  The  Viennese,  in  consternation,  came 
forth  in  the  garb  of  suppliants,  and,  by  a bribe,  it  was  said, 
administered  skilfully  to  Valens,  obtained  an  indulgent  hear- 
ing. But  Valens  himself  was  obliged  in  turn  to  bribe  his 
own  soldiers,  by  a largess  of  three  hundred  sesterces  to  each. 
At  every  place  indeed  where  he  halted  his  devouring  legions, 
and  at  every  place  which  he  was  induced  to  pass  without 
halting,  this  rapacious  chief  required  to  be  gratified  with 
money,  under  threats  of  plunder  and  conflagration.  His 
line  of  march  from  Vienne  lay  through  the  country  of  the 
Allobroges  and  Vocontii,  and  so  by  the  well-trodden  pass  of 
the  Mont  Gen&vre  into  Italy.1 

Meanwhile  the  other  stream  of  invasion  was  descending  ■ 
through  the  country  of  the  Helvetii,  a people  fiercer  and  more 
brave  than  the  long  pacified  western  Gauls,  and  Cfecmamarcii- 
not  yet  aware  of  the  death  of  Galba,  whose  name  country  of  the 
was  still  remembered  perhaps  with  respect  in  Berthe  Great 
the  valleys  of  the  Rhone  and  Drance.2  The  li-  st- Bernard- 
cence  Caecina  allowed  his  soldiers  was  here  fiercely  resented, 
and  the  course  of  the  expedition  was  tracked  with  blood  and 
fire,  while  the  Roman  garrisons  in  Rhaetia  were  invited  to 
attack  the  natives  in  the  rear.  Driven  from  fastness  to  fast- 
ness, the  Helvetii  made  their  last  defence  behind  the  walls 
of  Aventicum,  and  yielded  only  to  the  threat  of  a regular 
siege,  of  storm,  sack,  and  slaughter.  Caecina  was  now  satis- 
fied with  the  execution  of  their  leader,  Julius  Alpinulus,  and 
left  the  other  captives  to  be  dealt  with  by  Vitellius  at  his 
leisure.3  The  poor  people  were  allowed  to  send  a deputation 

1 The  mention  of  Lucus  Augusti  or  Luc  indicates  the  route  taken  by  this 
division  of  the  Vitellians,  which  must  have  crossed  from  the  Drome  to  the 
Durance,  and  so  by  Embrun  to  the  Col.  Genevre.  Tac.  Hist.  i.  62-66. 

2 Sulpidius  Galba,  the  legatus  of  Caesar  and  conqueror  of  the  Seduni,  was 
the  emperor’s  great-grandfather.  Suet.  Galb.  3. 

3 Aventicum,  the  modern  Avenches.  Tac.  Hist.  i.  6f7-f7 0.  Its  sufferings 
were  afterwards  repaid  by  the  foundation  of  a colony  under  Vespasian.  The 
pretty  but,  unfortunately,  spurious  epitaph  on  Julia  Alpinula — “ Exorare  patris 
necem  non  potui,”  kc. — refers  to  this  event. 


324 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


to  the  emperor ; but  he  gave  them  a harsh  reception,  while 
his  soldiers  furiously  threatened  them  : they  obtained  grace 
at  last  through  the  artful  eloquence  of  Claudius  Cossus,  one 
of  their  number,  who  swayed  the  feelings  of  the  multitude 
to  compassion,  not  less  boisterously  expressed  than  their  re- 
cent anger. 

While  this  double  invasion,  like  that  of  the  Cimbri  and 
Teutones  of  old,  was  thus  beetling  on  the  summits  of  the 
Alps,  Otho  was  preparing  to  receive  it  with  alert- 

Otho  prepares  1 ’ . ^ . 1 ° 

for  war,  but  of-  ness  and  intrepidity.  .Bounding  irom  his  volup- 
accommoda-  tuous  couch  at  the  nrst  sound  ot  the  trumpet, 
cheerful  at  the  sight  of  danger  as  he  had  been 
anxious  and  desperate  amidst  luxuries  and  honours,  his  first 
aim  was  to  secure  the  good  wishes  of  the  best  men,  by  sacri- 
ficing the  detested  Tigellinus,  and  releasing  Celsus,  a trusty 
adherent  of  Galba,  whom  he  had  saved  before  from  his  own 
soldiers  and  reserved  perhaps  with  a view  to  the  crisis  which 
had  now  arrived.  Here  was  an  example  of  pardon  for  the 
past,  and  hope  also  of  pardon  for  the  future.  The  Vitellians, 
it  proclaimed,  need  not  despair  : let  them  repent  of  their  re- 
volt and  resume  their  allegiance  to  the  chief  of  the  state,  ac- 
cepted by  the  Senate  and  People.  The  emperor  deigned  to 
make  overtures  of  conciliation  to  Vitellius  himself.  He  ad- 
dressed him  with  more  than  one  letter,  in  which,  with  fair 
words  and  flattery,  he  offered  him  money  and  favour,  and 
any  tranquil  retreat  he  might  himself  select  for  the  enjoy- 
ment of  ease  and  luxury  in  a private  station.1  Yitellius  too, 
on  his  part,  was  equally  timid,  or  equally  politic,  and  several 
messages  of  compliment  passed  between  the  rivals,  while 
each  was  determined, — for  one,  at  least,  his  own  officers  had 
determined, — to  abide  the  issue  of  a contest.  Meanwhile  on 
either  side  secret  emissaries  were  employed  to  tamper  with 
the  adherents  of  the  opposite  party.  Yalens  tried  to  shake 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  74.  Suetonius  goes  further,  and  affirms  that  Otho  “offered 
himself”  as  colleague  to  Yitellius,  and  proposed  to  marry  hi3  daughter.  Otho, 
8.  Dion  says  that  he  proposed  to  accept  Vitellius  as  his  own  colleague,  lxiv. 
10. 


A.U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


325 


the  devotion  of  the  praetorians  to  Otho,  by  representing  his 
own  emperor  as  the  first  proclaimed,  and  their  chief  as  a 
mere  intruder  : but  these  attempts  had  no  success  either  in 
Rome  or  in  Gaul ; men’s  minds  were  everywhere  prepared  for 
battle,  and  would  not  be  disappointed  of  the  slaughter,  and 
the  spoil  or  confiscation  which  might  be  expected  to  follow. 

During  the  advance  of  the  invaders  from  the  North,  the 
news  of  Otho’s  accession  had  flown  fast  into  the  East,  and 
even  in  the  West  it  had  out-stripped  the  heralds  The  legions 
of  Vitellius.  The  troops  in  Illyricum  were  the 
first,  as  they  were  the  nearest,  to  accept  the  ap-  sf^oAhe ap- 
pointment of  Otho,  and  this  accession  of  force  er- 
gave  him  considerable  confidence.  Mucianus  from  Syria, 
Vespasian  from  Palestine,  announced  the  adhesion  of  their 
legions  to  the  choice  of  the  capital ; the  oath  of  fidelity  was 
repeated  without  dissent  along  the  whole  coast  of  Africa, 
Crescens,  a freedman  of  Nero,  leading  the  way  at  Carthage, 
and  presuming  to  anticipate  the  proconsul’s  decision.  Clu- 
vius  Rufus,  who  commanded  in  one  of  the  provinces  of  Spain, 
reported  that  the  troops  throughout  the  peninsula  would 
prove  faithful  to  the  murderer  of  Galba ; but  suddenly  it  was 
found  that  they  had  declared  for  Vitellius.  Julius  Cordus 
administered  the  oath  in  Aquitania ; but  here  again  the  emis- 
saries of  Vitellius  succeeded  in  bringing  the  soldiers  over  to 
their  own  side.  The  Narbonensis  naturally  embraced  the 
Gaulish  faction,  overawed  by  the  proximity  of  its  formid- 
able armies.  Thus  the  legions  throughout  the  whole  Roman 
world  stood  to  arms  ; the  civil  functionaries,  the  citizens,  the 
provincials,  and  lastly  the  allies  and  tributaries  followed  the 
impulse  of  the  soldiery,  and  were  prepared,  by  force  of  habit, 
if  not  from  personal  inclination,  to  yield  them  the  support 
they  required.  This  universal  movement  of  civil  strife  was 
primarily  a military  one ; but  in  every  quarter  the  people 
were  ranged,  as  far  as  they  could  render  service,  on  the  side 
chosen  by  their  presidiary  troops.  In  fact  the  population 
generally  throughout  the  empire,  disarmed,  unwarlike,  and 
accustomed  to  look  on  the  armed  soldier  as  the  appointed  ar- 


326 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  69. 


biter  of  its  destinies,  had  now  lost  whatever  independence  of 
choice  or  power  of  action  it  may  once  have  claimed  to  exer- 
cise in  questions  of  imperial  policy.1 

It  was  among  the  first  cares  of  Otho’s  government,  so  to 
order  the  succession  of  consuls  for  the  year  as  to  secure  him 
friends  without  increasing  the  number  of  his  ene- 

McESurGS  of  ^ 

otho’s  govern-  mies.  The  death  of  Galba  and  Vinius  left  both 
chairs  vacant,  and  so,  in  the  confusion  of  the 
times,  they  seem  to  have  remained  to  the  end  of  February. 
To  maintain  the  dignity  of  the  imperial  office,  as  well  as  to 
give  to  it,  as  it  were,  the  sanction  of  the  senate,  Otho  named 
himself  and  his  brother  Titianus  consuls  for  March  and 
April ; Yirginius  was  appointed  to  succeed  in  May,  a com- 
pliment to  the  Gaulish  legions  which  Galba  had  jealously 
withheld,  with  Yopiscus,  who  was  connected  wdth  the  colony 
of  Yienna,  for  his  colleague.  The  other  consulships  for  the 
year,  two  months  being  often  at  this  period  a common  term 
of  office  for  each  pair,  were  confirmed  to  the  personages 
whom  Galba,  or  even  Nero  before  him,  had  already  desig- 
nated. Priesthoods  and  augurships  were  bestowed  on  vet- 
eran dignitaries,  who  had  passed  the  age  for  more  laborious 
occupations,  and  the  children  of  deceased  exiles  were  com- 
pensated for  their  sufferings  by  the  restoration  of  honours 
forfeited  by  their  fathers.  Many  representatives  of  noble 
houses  were  thus  readmitted  to  the  senate,  and  some  who 
had  been  punished  under  Nero  for  malversation  in  their 
provinces  were  pardoned,  as  though  they  too  had  been  inno- 
cent victims  of  an  indiscriminate  tyranny.  Such  were  the 
new  emperor’s  measures  for  conciliating  the  nobles.  At  the 
same  time  he  issued  edicts  in  rapid  succession  for  the  grati- 
fication of  the  provincials,  whose  fidelity  it  seemed  most  im- 
portant to  secure,  among  whom  were  the  people  of  Bsetica  in 
Spain,  and  the  Lingones  in  Gaul.  The  rumour  that  he  con- 
templated celebrating  Nero’s  memory  as  a boon  to  the  pop- 
ulace at  Rome  was  probably  an  invention  of  his  enemies.3 


1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  76-78. 


2 Tac.  Hist.  i.  77,  78. ; Plutarch,  Otho,  3. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


327 


We  may  believe,  however,  that  great  jealousy  of  the 
senate  pervaded  both  the  populace  and  the  soldiers.  The 
senators  were  reputed  Galba’s  friends  : they  had  otho’s  soldiers 
chosen  him  of  their  own  free  will ; but  Otho  they  JlStowar 
had  only  accepted.  The  soldiers  had  created  the  treachery- 
present  emperor,  and  they  were  ready  to  believe  that  the 
senators  were  intriguing  against  him.  A cohort  stationed  at 
Ostia  happened  to  be  summoned  to  the  city  ; its  equipments 
were  to  be  conveyed  in  waggons  for  distribution  to  the  men 
in  their  new  quarters  ; but  this  was  done  by  chance  at  night, 
and  in  an  unusual  way ; and  suddenly  the  men  took  alarm, 
conceived  a notion  that  their  arms  were  to  be  taken  from 
them  to  furnish  a band  of  senatorian  conspirators,  and,  seiz- 
ing horses,  rushed  tumultuously  to  Rome,  and  penetrated 
to  the  gates  of  the  palace.  Otho  at  the  moment  was  enter- 
taining a party  of  nobles  : the  soldiers  stormed  at  the  gates, 
without  a leader,  without  a banner,  exclaiming  that  they 
were  come  to  protect  their  emperor  from  the  designs  of  his 
treacherous  parasites.  The  guests  were  in  consternation : 
the  first  impulse  on  their  part  was  to  apprehend  treachery 
from  their  host.  When  he  desired  them  to  withdraw,  they 
made  their  way  as  they  best  could  to  their  homes  : scarcely 
had  they  quitted  the  chamber  before  the  doors  were  burst  in, 
and  the  furious  mob  demanded  Otho  to  be  presented  to 
them.  .Some  officers  they  wounded,  others  they  threatened, 
till  the  emperor  himself  leaped  upon  a couch,  and  from 
thence,  regardless  of  the  military  indecorum,  expostulated 
and  reasoned  with  his  manipulars.  With  great  difficulty 
they  were  persuaded  to  return  to  their  quarters.  The  next 
day  the  alarm  had  penetrated  through  the  whole  city ; 
houses  were  shut,  the  streets  were  deserted;  the  people  were 
in  dismay,  the  soldiers  anxious  and  uneasy.  The  prefect 
finally  composed  the  disturbance  by  promising  a largess  of 
five  thousand  sesterces  to  each  of  the  mutineers ; after  which 
Otho  ventured  to  enter  their  quarters,  and,  with  the  support 
of  their  officers,  demanded  two  only  of  the  most  violent  for 
punishment.  The  current  of  feeling,  already  checked  by  the 


328 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


promised  donative,  was  completely  turned  by  this  show  of 
moderation,  and  the  soldiers  congratulated  themselves  on  the 
magnanimity  of  their  leader,  who  could  thus  temper  justice 
with  mercy.1 

The  spirits  of  Otho  himself  were  roused  by  the  perils  of 
the  crisis,  and  he  displayed  activity,  vigour,  readiness,  and 
decision,  which  no  doubt  amazed  the  men  who 
the  popular  had  known  him  hitherto  only  as  a showy  profli- 
mmd  at  Rome.  j>ut  ap  0ther  classes  were  paralyzed  with 

alarm.  The  senators,  made  thus  rudely  sensible  of  the  sol- 
diers’ feelings  toward  them,  became  more  servile  to  the 
emperor,  more  profuse  in  their  adulation,  more  vehement  in 
denouncing  his  enemy ; yet  all  the  while  they  knew  that 
Otho,  so  lately  one  of  themselves,  was  not  deceived  by  this 
show  of  devotion,  and  apprehended  that  he  was  storing  up 
an  account  of  vengeance,  whenever  he  should  be  free  to  direct 
against  them  the  fury  of  the  soldiers  which  he  was  now 
nursing  against  the  adversary  in  the  field.2  The  people  were 
disturbed  by  a thousand  terrors,  real  and  imaginary.  They 
heard  that  Vitellians  were  among  them,  intriguing  with  both 
the  citizens  and  the  soldiers ; they  distrusted  every  report, 
whether  of  successes  or  disasters ; they  were  scared  by  the 
rumour  of  prodigies,  the  dropping  of  the  reins  from  the  hands 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  80-82. ; Plutarch,  Otho , 3. ; Dion,  lxiv.  9.  That  the  senate 
was  really  hostile  to  Otho  there  can  be  no  doubt.  It  was  both  alarmed  and 
mortified  by  the  way  in  which,  while  pretending  to  rely  on  its  authority,  he  co- 
quetted with  the  soldiers  and  the  populace. 

It  is  well  known  that  few,  if  any,  genuine  specimens  of  a brass  (senatorial) 
coinage  of  this  emperor  exist ; and  this  has  been  supposed  to  indicate  that  that 
body,  in  its  ill-will  to  him,  refused  to  stamp  his  name  and  countenance.  Eckhel, 
after  refuting  this  and  other  explanations  of  the  fact,  acknowledges  that  he  can 
offer  no  probable  solution  of  it.  It  is  allowed,  however,  that  there  are  a great 
number  of  brass  Galbas  extant ; and  I would  suggest,  that  as  the  senate,  per- 
haps in  the  excess  of  its  zeal  for  the  destroyer  of  Nero,  made  a large  issue  of 
this  coinage,  there  would  be  little  opportunity  for  a fresh  mintage  during  the 
few  months  of  Otho’s  power.  It  may  be  observed,  moreover,  that  the  Vitellian 
brasses  also  are  comparatively  rare.  See  Eckhel,  Hod.  Numm.  vi.  305. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  i.  85.:  “Et  privato  Othoni  nuper,  atque  eadem  dicenti,  nota 
adulatio.” 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


329 


of  a marble  Victory,  the  turning  of  Caesar’s  statue  from  west 
to  east ; and  finally,  a terrible  inundation  of  tbe  Tiber  seemed 
an  omen  of  worse  disasters.  When  tbe  force  of  tbe  waves, 
wbicb  bad  undermined  many  bouses,  was  abated,  they  still 
kept  possession  of  tbe  Campus  and  tbe  Flaminian  Way ; and 
it  was  remarked  as  an  evil  augury  that  when  Otho  first  led 
bis  cohorts  out  of  tbe  city,  be  was  impeded  in  bis  march 
northward  by  tbe  waters  themselves,  or  by  tbe  ruins  they 
had  created.1 

While  tbe  Priests  and  Flamens,  tbe  Salii  and  tbe  Vestals, 
with  tbe  mighty  mob  of  Rome  in  their  train,  conducted  a 
lustral  procession  round  tbe  pomserium,  tbe 

1 1 . Otho’s  distrust 

emperor  was  meditating  tbe  plan  ot  bis  cam-  of  his  own  offi- 
paign,  with  the  view  of  turning  the  flank  of  tbe 
invaders  already  hovering  on  tbe  Alps.  Tbe  naval  force  at 
Ostia  was  warmly  attached  to  him,  for  be  had  caressed  the 
remnant  of  Nero’s  marines  after  tbe  chastisement  they  bad 
suffered  from  Galba,  constituting  them  a regular  corps  for 
tbe  land  service,  wbicb  was  reputed  more  honourable  than 
their  own.  Tbe  men  now  to  be  employed  on  board  ship 
might  hope  for  similar  advancement ; for  it  was  Otbo’s  plan 
to  equip  an  armament  first  for  tbe  recovery  of  tbe  Narbo- 
nensis,  and  eventually  for  operations  in  the  rear  of  the  Vitel- 
lian  expedition.2  Some  city  cohorts  and  some  battalions  of 
tbe  guard  were  added  to  tbe  marine  force ; on  tbe  latter 
especial  reliance  was  placed,  and  their  officers  were  employed 
to  watch  tbe  emperor’s  generals  not  less  than  to  assist  them. 
Nothing  indeed  showed  more  clearly  tbe  precariousness  of 
Otbo’s  position  than  tbe  precautions  be  was  obliged  to  take 
against  tbe  very  men  whom  be  charged  with  bis  defence. 
Though  be  enjoyed  tbe  services  of  Suetonius,  tbe  greatest 
captain  of  tbe  times,  together  with  other  men  of  vigour  and 
conduct,  be  deemed  it  necessary  to  set  Proculus,  tbe  prseto- 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  86. ; Plut.  Otho , 4. 

2 The  expression  of  Tacitus,  “ spe  honoratioris  in  posterum  militiae,”  is  the 
same  as  that  of  Livy,  xxxii.  23. ; from  which  it  appears  that  the  legionary  ser- 
vice was  considered  of  a higher  grade  than  the  marine. 


330 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


rian  prefect,  a mere  policeman  without  military  experience, 
as  a spy  oyer  them,  with  instructions  to  foment  their  jeal- 
ousies and  secure  their  fidelity  to  himself  by  divisions  among 
one  another.  Finally,  a freedman,  named  Oscus,  seems  to 
have  been  set  as  a spy  over  Proculus.1 

But  Otho  was  too  active  and  high-spirited  himself  to  trust 
entirely  to  his  marines  or  his  soldiers,  to  his  generals  or  his 
freedmen.  He  led  his  land  forces  in  person,  and 

Otho  marches  . . _ _ 

at  the  head  of  required  the  magistrates  and  the  consulars  to 
attend  him,  not  as  combatants,  for  which  many 
of  them  by  age  and  habit  were  unfit,  but  as  companions,  in 
order  to  secure  their  persons  and  remove  them  from  the  city. 
Otho  indeed  was  studiously  mild  in  the  treatment  even  of 
those  whose  intrigues  he  had  most  reason  to  apprehend.  He 
was  satisfied  with  commanding  Lucius,  a brother  of  Aulus 
Yitellius,  to  accompany  him  to  the  field,  treating  him  with 
the  same  courtesy  as  others.  It  is  pleasant  also  to  read,  as 
an  unusual  feature  in  civil  war,  that  he  extended  his  protec- 
tion to  his  opponent’s  children,  who  were  left  in  the  city,  and 
whom  their  father  had  no  means  of  protecting  but  by  a 
threat  of  reprisals  on  Titianus,  Otho’s  brother,  for  Otho  him- 
self was  wifeless  and  childless.  But,  surrounded  as  he  was 
by  a gay  and  unwarlike  nobility,  vain  of  the  softness  of  their 
manners,  of  their  beauty,  their  dress,  and  their  equipments, 
the  emperor  himself,  long  known  as  a mere  dissolute  fop, 
suddenly  threw  off  the  habits  of  his  past  life,  and  embraced 
without  a murmur  all  the  austerities  of  service ; clad  in  steel, 
unwashed,  uncombed,  he  marched  on  foot  at  the  head  of  his 
columns,  as  if  to  belie  beforehand  the  sarcasm  of  the  satirist, 
that  he  waged  a civil  war  with  a mirror  in  his  knapsack.2 
His  forces  indeed  were  slender,  consisting  chiefly  of  the 
praetorians  and  marines,  and  his  preparations  had  probably 
been  retarded  by  want  of  money,  while  the  population  suf- 

1 Tac.  Hist.  i.  87. 

2 Contrast  the  description  in  Tacitus,  Hist.  ii.  11.:  “horridus,  incomptus, 
famaeque  dissimilis,”  with  the  well-known  sarcasm  of  Juvenal,  ii.  103. : 

“Speculum  civilis  sarcina  belli.” 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


331 


fered  from  the  seizure  of  all  the  specie  that  could  he  collected, 
and  it  was  now  too  late  to  occupy  the  passes  of  the  Alps 
and  confine  the  Vitellians  to  the  Gaulish  provinces.  Csecina 
had  entered  the  Cisalpine,  and  Yalens  was  hastening  to  join 
him ; hut  Otho’s  fleet  had  thrown  garrisons  into  the  strong 
places  along  the  coast-road,  and  four  legions  were  advancing 
with  rapid  strides  from  Illyricum,  to  turn  the  head  of  the 
Adriatic.  Five  cohorts  of  praetorians,  some  squadrons  of 
cavalry,  and  a hody  of  two  thousand  gladiators,  were  sent 
forward  to  seize  the  fords  and  bridges  of  the  Po ; and  the 
Othonians  hoped  to  choose  their  own  positions  in  the  plains 
on  which  the  enemy  was  to  he  met,  and  the  empire  to  he 
lost  or  won.1 

While  the  main  forces  on  hoth  sides  were  converging 
from  many  quarters  to  the  centre  of  the  Padane  valley,  the 
skirmishes  which  occurred  elsewhere  were  of  little  operations  of 
real  importance.  Otho’s  fleet,  after  provoking  ^eLigmian11 
hy  wanton  plunder  the  natives  of  the  Ligurian  coast- 
coast,  began  to  harass  the  shores  of  Gaul,  and  Yalens  was 
induced  hy  the  cries  of  the  Foro-julians  to  detach  some  co- 
horts for  their  protection.  Troops  were  landed  from  the 
vessels,  and  various  actions  took  place  with  no  serious  result. 
Corsica  was  easily  persuaded  to  side  with  the  masters  of  the 
sea ; hut  its  governor  was  at  private  feud  with  Otho,  and 
tried  to  secure  it  for  Yitellius.  His  efforts  were  nearly 
crowned  with  success,  hut  the  people  rose  at  last  against 
him,  put  him  to  death,  and  sent  his  head,  in  token  of  their 
fidelity,  to  Otho,  who,  however,  was  too  much  occupied  with 
greater  matters  to  reward  or  acknowledge  it.2 

1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  12-15.  After  the  event  it  was  objected  that  Otho  had  set 
out  too  precipitately : “ expeditionem  impigre  atque  etiam  praepropere  inchoa- 
vit.”  Suet.  Otho,  8.  Evil  auspices  of  course  were  recorded,  and  it  was  partic- 
ularly remarked  that  he  had  neglected  to  make  the  solemn  display  of  the 
Ancilia,  without  which  no  military  enterprise  had  ever  succeeded.  The  month 
of  March  was  appointed  for  this  ceremony,  after  which,  accordingly,  the  mili- 
tary season  commenced.  See  the  commentators  on  Suetonius.  Otho  set  out 
on  the  day  of  Cybele,  the  24th  of  March  (ix.  kal.  April). 

2 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  16.  Agric.  V. 


332 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


By  the  time  that  Otho’s  forces  arrived  on  the  southern 
bank  of  the  Po,  the  Transpadane  region  westward  of  the 
The  Ottomans  Addua,  the  most  flourishing  district  of  Italy  as  it 
setvesat pia™"  was  regarded  in  the  time  of  Tacitus,  had  fallen 
crosStoPo to  of  the  Vitellians.  A few  flying 

Bedriacum.  squadrons  of  Othonians,  which  had  crossed  the 
river,  had  been  cut  off  by  the  invaders.1  The  Vitellians  were 
elated  with  this  success,  and  their  Batavian  horse  dashed 
into  the  stream,  and  secured  an  easy  passage  for  Csecina’s 
foremost  columns.  Placentia,  a place  of  strength,  was  held 
for  Otho  by  Vestricius  Spurinna.  At  first  he  was  unable  to 
restrain  the  impetuosity  of  his  men,  who  rushed  of  their  own 
accord  to  meet  the  enemy ; but  the  labour  of  digging  the 
trenches  for  their  encampment  at  night  damped  the  ardour 
of  this  indolent  police,  and  as  Caecina  advanced  they  retreated 
hastily  behind  their  walls.  The  Vitellians,  on  their  part,  dis- 
dained to  form  a regular  siege  ; the  contempt  in  which  the 
veterans  held  Otho’s  marines  and  gladiators,  urged  them  to 
rush  to  the  assault.  In  the  course  of  this  attack  the  amphi- 
theatre outside  the  city,  the  largest  building  of  the  kind  in 
Italy,  but  constructed  apparently  of  wood,  was  consumed  by 
fire,  which  the  Placentians  ascribed  to  the  spite  of  some  of 
their  own  neighbours.  However  this  may  be,  the  assault 
was  unsuccessful,  and  Csecina  was  obliged  to  withdraw  be- 
yond the  Po,  to  await  the  arrival  of  Valens,  who  was  re- 
tarded by  insubordination  in  his  camp,  and  by  the  necessity 
of  detaching  a part  of  his  forces  for  the  defence  of  the  Nar- 
bonensis.  The  Othonians  meanwhile  collected  in  greater 
strength,  and,  having  crossed  the  river  at  a lower  point, 
established  themselves  at  Bedriacum,  at  the  junction  of  the 
Oglio  and  the  Chiese,  commanding  the  road  from  Cremona 
to  Verona  on  the  one  side,  and  Mantua  on  the  other.  The 
temper  of  the  troops  about  to  be  opposed  to  each  other  dif- 
fered considerably.  On  the  Vitellian  side  the  two  leaders 
were  thoroughly  earnest  in  their  enterprise  ; they  were 

1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  17.:  “Capta  Pannoniorum  cohors  apud  Cremonam.  Inter- 
cept! centum  equites  ac  mille  classici  inter  Placentiam  Ticinumque.” 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


333 


engaged  in  a revolt  beyond  hope  of  pardon,  and  success  was 
necessary  for  them ; but  their  forces  could  much  less  be  relied 
on,  formed  as  they  were  by  the  union  of  many  nations  under 
one  banner,  with  no  personal  interest  in  their  chiefs  or  then- 
party,  and  little  else  to  animate  them  but  the  natural  ferocity 
of  trained  swordsmen,  and  the  lust  of  plunder.  It  was  diffi- 
cult to  maintain  their  discipline,  and  every  day  relaxed  the 
bands  of  their  obedience.  Otho’s  soldiers,  on  the  other  hand, 
were  inspired  by  very  different  motives.  The  praetorians 
had  to  defend  an  emperor  of  their  own  choice ; to  maintain 
their  sudden  claim  to  bestow  the  purple  ; to  retain  their  pre- 
scriptive right  to  favours  and  largesses ; to  acquire  a reputa- 
tion in  the  field,  and  throw  off  the  degrading  name  of  a mere 
police.  The  gladiators  were  emulous  of  the  fame  of  the 
legionaries  : the  legionaries  of  Illyricum  thirsted  to  measure 
swords  with  the  conquerors  of  Germany  and  Britain.  But, 
ardent  as  they  were  for  the  fight,  their  want  of  discipline 
and  mutual  confidence  caused  great  disquietude  to  the  old 
soldiers  their  commanders.  Suetonius  was  dismayed  at  the 
rawness  of  the  levies  he  was  expected  to  lead  to  victory,  and 
urged  delay.1  His  colleagues,  however,  Marius  Celsus,  Pro- 
culus,  and  Gallus,  shrewd  competitors  for  Otho’s  favour, 
were  jealous  of  him  and  of  one  another.  The  emperor  could 
only  settle  their  disputes  by  calling  Titianus  from  the  city, 
and  placing  him  over  them  all ; and  thus  assured  of  at  least 
one  faithful  officer,  and  wearied  with  the  discord  of  those 
around  him,  he  impatiently  waived  all  cautious  counsels,  and 
gave  the  signal  for  attack.2 

It  is  no  reflection  on  Otho’s  courage  that  he  abstained 
from  leading  his  own  armies.  He  was  conscious  that  he  had 
no  military  experience,  yet  the  imperator  of  the  BattieofBe- 
legions  could  not  yield  the  place  of  general  to  a driacam- 

1 Besides  the  chief  in  command,  there  was  another  Suetonius  in  the  Otho- 
nian  army,  tribune  of  the  Thirteenth  legion.  This  was  Suetonius  Lenis,  the 
father  of  the  biographer  of  the  Caesars,  who  has  himself  recorded  the  fact,  add- 

ing that  he  derived  from  him  some  interesting  particulars  of  the  emperor’s  last 
hours.  Suet.  Otho , 10.  2 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  33. 


334 


HISTORY  OP  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


lieutenant  in  the  field.  He  retired  to  Brixellum,  on  the  right 
bank  of  the  Po,  to  receive  the  fresh  troops  which  were  rap- 
idly arriving,  and  organize  them  for  the  campaign ; but  he 
left  his  legates  to  fight  the  battle  which  he  hoped  would  de- 
cide it  at  a blow.  This  division,  however,  of  forces,  which 
were  not  too  numerous  to  be  kept  together  in  one  body,  still 
more  this  retirement  of  the  chief  himself  from  the  head  of 
his  own  army,  seems  to  have  been  fatal  to  the  cause.  The 
men  were  disturbed  and  discouraged,  and  the  movements  of 
their  leaders  became  more  than  ever  vacillating  and  uncer- 
tain. Against  the  advice  of  Suetonius,  Proculus  and  Titia- 
nus  insisted  on  advancing  from  Bedriacum ; they  fixed  their 
camp  at  the  fourth  milestone  on  the  road  to  Cremona,  but 
pleading  the  urgent  commands  of  Otho  himself,  they  marched 
sixteen  miles  further,  to  the  confluence  of  the  Po  and  the 
Addua.  Their  object  seems  to  have  been  to  interrupt  the 
operations  of  Caecina,  who  was  throwing  a bridge  across  the 
Po,  with  the  intention,  apparently,  of  outflanking  them,  and 
. attacking  Otho  at  Brixellum.  A parley  took  place  between 
him  and  some  of  their  officers : it  was  interrupted  by  an 
order  from  Yalens  to  attack ; the  Vitellians  issuing  from  their 
camp  were  severely  handled;  again  they  recovered  them- 
selves, and  the  Othonians  in  their  turn  suffered  from  the  in- 
decision or  the  treachery  of  their  leaders.  On  a false  re- 
port that  the  Vitellians  had  abandoned  their  emperor,  they 
grounded  arms,  and  saluted  them  as  friends : undeceived  by 
a fiercer  onset,  they  defended  themselves  with  desperation, 
but  with  little  order,  here  and  there,  in  the  groves  and  vine- 
yards, by  groups  or  maniples.  Those  who  retained  their 
footing  on  the  causeway  kept  more  solid  array ; here  there 
was  no  distant  fighting  with  arrows  or  javelins ; even  the 
pilum  was  thrown  aside,  and  the  opposing  bands,  rushing 
furiously  together,  thrust  with  the  shield,  and  smote  with 
the  sword,  till  the  ground  was  gained  or  lost  by  sheer 
strength  of  arm  and  courage.  The  vicissitudes  of  the  fray 
were  rapid,  various,  and  indecisive.  While  numbers  re- 
mained equal,  valour  and  strength  were  equally  balanced. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


335 


But  suddenly  Otho’s  generals  lost  heart  and  fled.  At  the 
same  moment  the  Vitellians  were  supplied  with  Defeat  of  the 
reinforcements ; they  charged  with  redoubled  0thonians- 
vigour,  and  broke  the  ranks  of  their  disconcerted  opponents. 
The  smooth  straight  road  tempted  the  worsted  battalions  to 
flight,  and,  hotly  pressed  and  cut  up  as  they  fled, — for  none 
cared  to  capture  men  who  could  not  be  sold  as  slaves, — they 
hurried  without  a rally  towards  Bedriacum.  Suetonius  and 
Proculus  had  already  passed  straight  through  the  lines,  nor 
halted  to  attempt  their  defence.  Titianus  and  Celsus  exerted 
themselves  with  more  spirit  to  stop  the  fugitives,  and  rallied 
a handful  of  men  under  the  shelter  of  the  entrenchments, 
which  they  closed  and  guarded  through  the  night.  The 
Vitellians  drew  up  at  the  fifth  milestone,  that  is,  when  they 
came  in  sight  of  the  Othonian  camp,  which  they  were  not 
furjiished  with  engines  to  assault : they  lay  down  to  rest  on 
the  spot,  without  pausing  to  fortify  themselves;  and  the 
Othonians  were  too  weary  or  too  terrified  to  molest  them. 
The  next  morning  the  beaten  army  treated  for  a capitula- 
tion ; their  envoys  were  favourably  received,  and  the  gates 
were  immediately  opened.  The  soldiers  fell  sobbing  into 
one  another’s  arms ; friends  and  brothers  tended  each  other’s 
wounds.  All  denounced  in  common  the  wickedness  of  civil 
war ; some  even  returned  to  the  field  to  bury  the  bodies  of 
their  fallen  kinsmen ; but  the  feelings  of  religion  or  human- 
ity extended  to  a few  only,  and  the  greater  number  of  the 
dead  long  lay  uncared  for.1 

Otho  aAvaited  the  result  of  the  battle  at  Brixellum  with 
a mind  equally  composed  to  good  or  evil  tidings.  The  first 
uncertain  rumours  of  defeat  were  confirmed  by  otho  declines 
the  fugitives  from  the  field,  and  great  as  the  dis-  contest,  and 
aster  was,  it  may  be  supposed  that  they  rather  SdS.mits  sm" 

1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  41-45.  Plutarch,  who  seems  to  have  followed  Tacitus,  or 
at  least  to  have  used  the  same  authorities,  remarks  on  the  great  number  of  the 
slain,  because  none  were  interested  in  making  prisoners.  He  had  himself 
traversed  the  battle-field,  and  been  told  by  one  who  had  shared  the  fortunes  of 
the  beaten  army,  of  the  lofty  pile  of  corpses  which  was  raised  upon  it.  Plut. 
Otho , 14. 


336 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


enhanced  than  extenuated  it.  Nevertheless  the  legions 
which  had  not  been  engaged  were  not  dismayed  at  the  occur- 
rence. Without  waiting  for  the  emperor’s  exhortation,  they 
thronged  of  their  own  accord  around  him,  and  urged  him  to 
prove  their  valour  in  the  recovery  of  his  fortunes.  Plotius 
Firmus,  the  prefect  of  the  praetorians,  seconded  their  clam- 
orous importunities.  He  showed  how  strong  the  resources 
of  their  party  still  were,  and  pointed  to  the  legions  which 
were  even  now  advancing  to  join  them,  which  had  already 
announced  their  arrival  at  Aquileia,  and  declared  the  cour- 
age which  animated  them.  A common  soldier  drew  his 
sword  in  the  emperor’s  presence,  and  exclaiming,  This  is  the 
devotion  which  animates  us  all , plunged  it  into  his  own  bos- 
om.1 It  is  clear  that  Otho  was  possessed  of  ample  means 
for  continuing  the  contest.  But  he  had  determined  oth- 
erwise. His  life  had  been  a feverish  pursuit,  first  of  pleas- 
ure, and  afterwards  of  power.  Under  the  influence  of  a vivid 
imagination  guided  by  vulgar  delusions,  not  by  personal 
judgment  or  experience,  he  had  aspired  to  the  heights  of  hu- 
man happiness,  first  in  the  arms  of  gorgeous  beauty,  and 
again  in  the  purple  robe  of  imperial  sovereignty.  He  had 
waked  from  both  his  dreams  almost  at  the  moment  when  he 
seemed  to  realize  them ; and  these  visions,  as  they  flitted 
away  from  him,  left  him  sobered,  but  not  embittered,  disen- 
chanted but  not  cynical.  The  world,  he  was  now  convinced, 
was  not  worth  the  fighting  for : success  and  victory,  fame 
and  honour,  were  not  worth  the  fighting  for : his  own  life 
was  not  worth  the  fighting  for.  The  sentiment  of  the  noble 
voluptuary,  that  they  who  have  enjoyed  life  the  most  are 
often  the  most  ready  to  quit  it,  whatever  we  may  think  of 
its  justice  in  general,  was  never  more  conspicuously  fulfilled 
than  in  this  example.2  It  is  pleasant  to  believe  that  the  last 

1 Dion,  Ixiv.  11. ; Plut.  Otho , 15.;  Suet.  Otho,  10. 

2 Byron’s  Mazeppa : — 

“ And  strange  to  say,  the  sons  of  pleasure, 

They  who  have  revelled  beyond  measure 
In  beauty,  wassail,  wine  and  treasure, 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


337 


thoughts  of  this  misguided  spirit  were  for  the  peace  of  his 
country  and  the  safety  of  his  friends,  to  whom  he  counselled 
submission.  After  refusing  to  allow  a renewal  of  the  con- 
test, after  providing  as  he  best  could  for  the  bloodless  recog- 
nition of  the  emperor  whom  fortune  had  designated,  con- 
gratulating himself  that  he  had  set  an  example  of  clemency, 
in  sparing  the  family  of  Yitellius,  which  the  victor  for  very 
shame  must  follow,  Otho  laid  himself  calmly  on  his  couch. 
A tumult  arising  outside  his  tent,  in  which  Virginius  was 
threatened  with  violence,  together  with  others  of  the  sena- 
tors, who  at  their  master’s  bidding  were  leaving  the  camp, 
he  rose,  and  with  a few  words  rebuked  and  allayed  the 
wrath  of  his  fanatical  adherents.  As  evening  closed  he 
called  for  a cup  of  water,  and  for  two  daggers,  of  which  he 
chose  the  sharpest,  and  laid  it  under  his  pillow.  At  the 
same  time  he  ordered  his  attendant  to  quit  the  place,  and 
show  himself  to  the  soldiers,  lest  he  should  be  charged,  in 
their  intemperate  fury,  with  the  deed  he  was  about  himself 
to  perpetrate.  Assured  at  last  that  his  friends  had  got  be- 
yond the  lines,  he  lay  down,  and  slept  for  some  hours.  At 
break  of  day  he  drew  forth  his  weapon,  placed  it  to  his 
heart,  and  threw  his  weight  upon  it.  Nature  demanded  one 
groan.  The  slaves  and  freedmen  in  the  outer  chambers 
rushed  trembling  to  his  side,  and  with  them  the  prefect  Plo- 
tius.  Otho  lay  dead  with  a single  wound.  He  had  made 
one  request  only,  that  his  body  might  be  consumed  imme- 
diately, to  escape  the  indignity  of  exposure  and  decollation. 
The  praetorians  crowded,  with  shouts  and  tears,  to  support 
the  bier,  kissing  the  gaping  wound  and  the  hanging  hands. 
The  pyre  was  heaped,  and  the  noble  remains  laid  upon  it, 
and  when  the  flames  were  kindled  some  of  the  soldiers  slew 
themselves  on  the  spot.  This  barbarous  example  kindled 
the  emulation  of  the  legionaries,  and  at  Bedriacum,  at  Pla- 
centia, and  in  other  camps,  it  found  many  desperate  imita- 
tors. Finally  a modest  monument  was  raised  over  the  em- 

Die  calm,  and  calmer  oft  than  he 

Whose  heritage  was  misery.” 

VOL.  vi. — 22 


338 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  I).  69. 


peror’s  ashes,  such  as  the  conqueror  himself  would  scarcely 
grudge  to  an  honourable  opponent.1 

Then  once  again  was  the  empire  offered  by  the  soldiers 
to  Virginius,  and  again  did  the  veteran  refuse  it.  Neither 
The  empire  of-  woul(i  he  undertake,  as  they  next  requested  him, 
Vir^nmsfand  to  confer  w^h  Valens  and  Caecina  on  the  terms 
refused  by  him.  0f  an  arrangement  that  might  satisfy  both  par- 
ties. He  judged  the  cause  of  Oth o and  his  friends  as  hope- 
less as  it  was  unjust,  and  he  would  not  consent  to  act  in  its 
behalf.  They  drew  their  swords,  but  he  was  firm  in  his  re- 
fusal, and  at  last  only  escaped  at  the  back  of  his  tent  from 
their  fury.  Thus  baffled,  the  troops  at  Brixellum  promised 
their  unconditional  submission  to  the  victorious  generals, 
while  Flavius  Sabinus,  the  brother  of  Vespasian,  whom  Otho 
had  distinguished  with  high  marks  of  favour,  sent  the  cohorts 
he  commanded  to  the  camp  of  the  Vitellians.2  Of  the  sena- 
tors whom  Otho  had  carried  to  the  seat  of  war  his  soldiers 
were  not  less  jealous  than  himself,  and  after  the  rout  of  Be- 
driacum,  the  troops  which  attended  or  guarded  them  at  Mu- 
tina,  not  crediting  the  account  of  their  chief’s  disasters, 
watched  them  with  redoubled  vigilance,  and  at  last,  when 
the  news  was  confirmed,  scarcely  refrained  from  wreaking 
their  spite  upon  them.  Nor  did  these  unfortunate  nobles 
run  much  less  risk  at  the  hands  of  the  Vitellians,  who  be- 
lieved that  they  had  cheered  the  resistance,  and  delayed  the 
surrender  of  their  opponents ; and  this  risk  was  heightened 
by  the  imprudence  of  the  decurions  of  the  town,  in  still  of- 
fering arms  and  money,  and  styling  them  Conscript  Fathers ; 

1 Tac.  Hist,  it  47-50.;  Plut.  Otho,  15-18.;  Suet.  Otho,  10-12.;  Dion,  lxiv. 
11—15.  Otho  wanted  eleven  days  to  complete  his  37th  year;  his  reign  had 
lasted  ninety-five  days:  born  28th  April,  785,  he  died  17th  April,  822.  See 
Baumgarten-Crusius  on  Suetonius,  c.  11.,  who  explains  the  apparent  error  of 
his  author : “ tricessimo  et  octavo  aetatis  anno.”  Martial  expresses  the  com- 
mon sentiment  of  admiration  for  this  Roman  end,  vi.  32 : — 

“ Sic  Cato  dum  vixit,  sane  vel  Cassare  major : 

Dum  moritur,  numquid  major  Othone  fuit?  ” 

2 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  51. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


339 


still  more  by  the  daring  fiction  of  a freedman  of  Kero  named 
Caenus,  who  at  the  last  moment  spread  the  report  of  a fresh 
victory  over  the  invaders. 

At  Rome  in  the  meantime  there  was  no  hesitation,  no 
conflict  of  opinion.  The  games  of  Ceres  were  being  per- 
formed in  the  theatre,  and  the  populace  was  in-  The  senate  ac_ 
tent  only  on  the  amusement  of  the  hour,  when  it  asemplrorwith 
was  announced  that  Otho  was  dead,  and  the  pre-  acclamatlon* 
feet  Sabinus  had  required  the  soldiers  in  the  city  to  swear  to 
Vitellius.  The  name  of  the  new  emperor  was  received  at 
once  with  acclamations,  and  the  people,  streaming  forth, 
seized  the  images  of  Galba,  and  bore  them  crowned  with 
flowers  and  laurels  to  the  temples,  and  to  the  spot  where  his 
blood  had  fallen,  which  they  heaped  with  chaplets.  Such  of 
the  senators  as  were  still  at  home  met  immediately,  and  de- 
creed to  Vitellius  by  a single  act  all  the  honours  and  titles 
which  had  been  dealt  out  from  year  to  year  to  his  prede- 
cessors. Thanks  were  voted  to  the  Germanic  legions.  Va- 
lens  was  praised  for  his  dispatches,  which  affected  modera- 
tion and  respect,  but  the  senators  were  really  more  grateful 
to  Csecina,  who  had  proved  his  respect  by  not  addressing 
them  at  all.  Having  thus  done  all  in  their  power  to  concil- 
iate their  new  master,  they  still  awaited  his  arrival  with  anx- 
iety; for  amply  as  they  had  satisfied  his  desires,  it  might  not 
be  in  his  power  to  control  his  terrible  soldiery,  and  visions 
of  plunder,  of  confiscation  or  massacre,  rose  before  the  eyes 
of  a generation  to  which  the  civil  wars  of  Rome  were  mat- 
ter of  history.  The  fate  which  Rome  might  ^ Italian 
fear  at  a distance  alighted  actually  on  many  dis-  Jeredby  v"i- 
tricts  of  Italy;  for  the  fierce  warriors  of  the  tellius- 
north,  Romans  only  in  name,  who  had  scented  their  quarry 
from  the  Rhine,  now  fell  without  remorse  on  the  burghs  and 
colonies.  Valens  and  Csecina  were  too  criminal,  or  too  am- 
bitious themselves,  to  check  this  brutal  licentiousness.  The 
soldiers  of  Otho,  it  was  said,  had  exhausted  Italy ; but  it 
was  desolated  by  the  ruffians  of  Vitellius.1 

1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  55,  56. 


340 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


Meanwhile  Vitellius  had  been  collecting  his  troops  in 
Gaul,  or  advancing  leisurely  in  the  rear  of  his  legates,  indulg- 
ing at  this  crisis  of  his  affairs  the  natural  indo- 

Vitellius  ad-  ° .. 

vances  through  Jence  of  his  disposition,  sluggish  and  indifferent, 
without  pride  or  ambition,  with  no  thought  be- 
yond the  morrow,  yet  all  the  more  subject  to  be  worked  on 
by  cool  intriguers  and  led  into  sudden  excesses  of  cruelty 
or  violence.  He  carried  with  him  eight  thousand  of  the  lev- 
ies which  had  been  destined  to  reinforce  the  army  in  Brit- 
ain, besides  the  strength  of  the  Gallic  and  Germanic  legions. 
Scarcely  had  he  put  himself  in  motion,  when  the  news  of  the 
victory  at  Bedriacum  and  the  death  of  Otho  reached  him. 
At  the  same  time  the  accession  of  the  Mauretanian  provinces 
was  announced,  an  increase  of  military  strength  amounting 
to  nineteen  cohorts  and  five  squadrons  of  horse,  together 
with  a numerous  corps  of  native  auxiliaries.  About  the 
events  by  which  this  advantage  accrued  to  him,  the  rising 
of  the  praetor  Albums  for  his  rival,  the  frustration  of  this 
man’s  attempt  on  Spain,  his  flight  and  slaughter,  Yitellius 
made  no  inquiry : he  was  too  thoughtless  to  pay  attention 
to  the  details  of  his  affairs.  He  descended  the  gentle  current 
of  the  Saone  in  a barge,  while  his  troops  marched  along  the 
bank ; though  secure  of  his  conquest,  he  did  not  all  at  once 
assume  the  pomp  of  sovereignty.  He  had  quitted  Rome  a 
bankrupt;  and  he  was  returning  poor  and  squalid  as  he 
came ; till  Junius  Blsesus,  the  prefect  of  the  Lugdunensis,  a 
man  of  wealth  and  magnificence,  invested  him  with  the  en- 
signs of  empire.  Yitellius  seems  to  have  felt  this  officious 
zeal  as  a slur  on  his  own  torpidity,  and  resented  rather  than 
approved  it.  At  Lugdunum  he  was  met  by  Yalens  and 
Ciecina,  together  with  the  chiefs  of  the  conquered  party. 
Now  at  last  he  awoke,  and  understood  that  he  was  actually 
emperor.  From  his  tribunal  he  distributed  thanks  and 
praises,  and  commanded  the  army  to  salute  his  infant  son  as 
heir  to  the  purple.  He  associated  the  child  in  his  own  title 
of  Germanicus.1  Some  cruel  executions  followed,  and  the 
1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  59.  It  must  be  remarked,  however,  that  Galeria,  the  wife 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


341 


Illyrian  legions,  which  had  ranged  themselves  on  the  side  of 
Otho,  were  exasperated  by  the  slaughter  of  more  than  one 
of  their  officers.  The  dissensions  between  the  various  corps 
grew  daily  wider.  Suetonius  and  Proculus  sought  to  secure 
the  conqueror’s  regard  by  alleging  their  own  treachery  to 
Otho,  which  he  affected  to  believe,  and  after  some  delay  and 
contumelious  treatment,  pretended  to  receive  them  into  fa- 
vour. Titianus  was  pardoned,  ostensibly  from  respect  for 
his  fraternal  -affection ; at  all  events  he  deserved  well  for  his 
forbearance  towards  Galeria  and  her  children.  Marius  Cel- 
sus  was  suffered  to  retain  the  consulship.  The  vengeance  of 
Yitellius,  by  whatever  motives  it  was  influenced,  fell  gener- 
ally upon  lesser  victims.1 

Feelings,  indeed,  of  sympathy  for  human  suffering,  or 
respect  for  human  life,  were  as  alien  from  Yitellius  as  from 
his  class  generally.  On  the  removal  of  so  large  yiteiiius  gene- 
a portion  of  the  Roman  garrisons,  a Gaul  named  SwarKif6114 
Maricus,  raised  a revolt  among  his  countrymen.  enemies- 
He  pretended  to  be  a god,  immortal  and  invulnerable.  But 
he  was  captured  and  given  up  by  the  iEdui,  and  ruthlessly 
cast  forth  to  be  devoured  in  the  arena.  When  by  some 
chance  the  beasts  refused  to  touch  him,  and  his  trembling 
votaries  were  almost  reassured,  Yitellius  looked  on  coolly 
while  a gladiator  despatched  him.  But  he  was  too  careless, 
it  would  appear,  to  grasp  at  money,  and  for  money  the  mas- 
sacres of  the  civil  wars  had  generally  been  perpetrated.  Yi- 
tellius not  only  spared  his  enemies’  lives,  but  allowed  the 

of  Yitellius,  had  been  left  behind  at  Rome  with  her  children,  while  another  son 
by  a former  wife,  Petronia,  named  Petronianus,  was  grown  up  at  this  time,  if 
still  alive.  Suetonius,  indeed,  says  that  Vitellius  had  murdered  him  ( Vitell.  6.) ; 
but  whether  this  be  true  or  not,  there  seems  to  be  some  mistake  in  the  state- 
ment of  Tacitus. 

1 Suetonius  assures  us  (c.  10.)  that  Yitellius  put  to  death  a hundred  and 
twenty  persons  who  were  found,  from  papers  discovered  in  Otho’s  hands,  to 
have  claimed  a reward  for  the  slaughter  of  Galba.  The  most  distinguished 
victim  of  this  revolution  was  a Dolabella,  who  was  charged  with  attempting  to 
revive  Otho’s  faction  in  his  own  behalf.  He  was  slain,  under  atrocious  circum- 
stances, at  Interamnium.  See  Tac.  Hist,  ii,  63,  64. 


342 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


wills  of  such  as  had  fallen  in  the  field  to  take  effect  for  the 
benefit  of  their  relations.  His  interests  seemed 

Gluttony  his  . . 

prevailing  pas-  to  centre  in  the  gratification  of  an  inordinate 
gluttony,  and  as  he  marched  slowly  along,  all 
Italy,  from  sea  to  sea,  was  swept  for  delicacies  for  his  table. 
If  he  did  not  confiscate  his  enemies’  estates  to  lavish  them  on 
his  followers,  he  allowed  his  followers  to  indemnify  them- 
selves by  plundering  enemies  or  friends.  Even  after  the  har- 
vests reaped  by  two  preceding  armies,  enough^  it  seems,  re- 
mained to  satisfy  a third,  to  generate  a complete  relaxation 
of  discipline,  and  impress  the  soldier  with  avowed  contempt 
for  his  imperator.  The  edicts  Yitellius  sent  before  him  were 
sufficiently  moderate.  He  waived  for  the  present  the  title 
of  Augustus,  and  positively  refused  that  of  Csesar.  He 
ordered  the  diviners,  the  favourites  and  accomplices  of  Otho 
and  Nero,  to  be  expelled  from  Italy,  and  forbade  the  knights 
to  disgrace  their  order  by  descending  on  the  arena,  a prac- 
tice which  had  spread  from  Rome  itself  even  to  towns  in  the 
country.1  The  conduct  of  Galeria  the  wife,  and  Sextilia  the 
mother,  of  the  new  emperor,  might  help  to  reassure  the 
minds  of  the  better  class.  Both  these  matrons  were  exam- 
ples of  moderation  and  prosperity.  Sextilia  looked  with  dis- 
trust on  her  son’s  extraordinary  advancement,  refusing  all 
public  honours  herself,  and  replying  to  the  letter  in  which 
he  first  addressed  her  by  his  new  appellation,  that  she  had 
borne  a Yitellius,  and  not  a Germanicus.  But  this  high- 
minded  woman  died  shortly  after,  and  some  insinuated  that 
her  son  had  starved  her  to  death,  because  it  had  been  pre- 
dicted that  he  would  reign  long  if  he  survived  his  parent : 
others  that  he  had  given  her  poison  at  her  own  request, 

1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  62.  The  mathematici  were  odered  to  quit  Italy  by  the  ka- 
lends of  October.  They  revenged  themselves  by  posting  a placard,  in  which 
they  intimated  that  Yitellius  himself  should  quit  the  world  (“  ne  usquam  esset  ”) 
before  that  day.  Suet.  Vitell.  16.  Yitellius,  however,  did  not  die  till  the  end 
of  December.  Dion  (Ixv.  1.)  declares  that  the  exact  day  was  predicted,  but 
prudently  abstains  from  citing  the  date  fixed  by  the  decree. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


343 


through  dread  of  impending  reverses.1  Such  are  the  kind 
of  stories,  improbable  and  inconsistent  with  one  another,  of 
which  much  of  our  history,  if  it  be  written  at  all,  must  now 
consist. 

But  already  Yitellius,  or  at  least  his  shrewder  advisers, 
began  to  feel  the  perils  of  his  position,  tossed  as  he  was  on 
the  waves  of  so  many  conflicting  tides  of  military 

J J Discharge  of 

insurrection.  The  Illyrian  legions  he  had  al-  the  praetorians, 

> _ ° and  disposal  of 

ready  mortified  ; but  he  could  not  suffer  the  prse-  the  othonian 

. ...  . . . X1  . legions. 

tonans  to  retain  their  usurped  authority,  and  it 
was  necessary  to  disband  them.2 3  The  Fourteenth  legion, 
which  had  fought  for  Otho  at  Bedriacum,  and  refused  to  ad- 
mit that  it  had  been  worsted,  was  burning  to  avenge  the  dis- 
grace incurred  from  the  event  of  a few  trifling  skirmishes. 
This  division  had  been  recalled  from  Britain  by  Nero,  and 
thither  it  was  now  ordered  to  return.  The  First  legion  of 
marines  was  drafted  into  Spain.  The  Eleventh  and  Seyenth 
were  sent  at  the  commencement  of  summer  into  winter  quar- 
ters. The  Thirteenth  was  employed  in  the  erection  of  am- 
phitheatres at  Cremona  and  Bononia,  where  Csecina  and 
Yalens  proposed  to  amuse  the  soldiers  with  gladiatorial 
shows. 

The  advance  of  Yitellius  still  continued  to  be  marked  by 
excesses  and  horrors  of  various  kinds.  At  Ticinum,  the  dis- 


1 Suet.  Vitell.  14.  As  we  come  near  to  the  time  of  Suetonius,  the  retailei 

of  these  and  similar  rumours,  the  domestic  history  of  the  Caesars  becomes  less 
trustworthy  than  ever.  He  could  now  only  relate  the  anecdotes  of  the  day,  not 
yet  sifted  and  sanctioned  by  any  standard  authority.  The  death  of  Sextilia  is 
mentioned  by  Tacitus  without  intimating  that  any  suspicion  attached  to  it.  See 
Hist.  iii.  6*7. : “ Erat  illi  fessa  aetate  parens,  quae  tamen,  paucis  ante  diebus,  op- 
portuna  morte  excidium  domus  praevenit,  nihil  principatu  filii  adsecuta  nisi  luc- 
tum  et  bonam  famam.”  Comp.  Hist  ii.  64. : “ Sextilia  ....  antiqui  moris 
....  domus  suae  tantum  adversa  sensit.” 

3 Tac.  Hist  ii.  67. : “ Addito  honestae  missionis  lenimento  arma  ad  tribunos 
suos  deferebant.”  The  historian  adds  that  at  the  next  outbreak  of  civil  war 
these  reckless  soldiers,  who  it  may  be  supposed  had  continued  to  linger  in  the 
city,  offered  their  services  to  the  opponent  of  Yitellius. 


344 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


ruption  of  the  bands  of  discipline  was  more  than 

Military  dis-  x ■*- 

tiirbance  at  ever  apparent.  The  emperor  lay  down  to  supper 
with  Yirginius  by  his  side.  The  legates  and  tri- 
bunes thronged  to  his  orgies.  Outside  the  imperial  tent, 
centurions  and  soldiers  emulated  the  dissipation  of  their 
chief.  Drunkenness  and  disorder  reigned  throughout  the 
night.  A Gaul  and  a Roman  happened  to  challenge  one 
another  to  wrestle  ; the  legionary  fell,  the  auxiliary  mocked 
him;  his  comrades  flew  to  arms,  and  two  auxiliary  cohorts 
were  cut  to  pieces.  Battle  would  have  raged  throughout  the 
lines,  but  for  a seasonable  alarm.  The  return  of  the  Four- 
teenth legion  was  announced,  with  swords  drawn,  and 
standards  advanced,  and  an  attack  on  the  camp  was  appre- 
hended by  the  intoxicated  mob  within  it.  The  alarm  was 
false ; but,  while  it  lasted,  a slave  of  Yirginius  was  seized, 
and  charged  with  the  purpose  of  killing  the  emperor.  The 
Narrow  escape  death  of  Yirginius  was  now  loudly  demanded  by 
of  Virginius.  the  soldiers  around  the  tent.  Yitellius,  indeed, 
had  the  firmness  to  refuse  them ; he  could  not  afford  to  sacri- 
fice so  brave  and  honest  a friend.  This  was  the  third  escape 
of  Yirginius,  and  the  great  age  he  eventually  attained  in 
peace  and  honour,  made  the  risks  of  his  early  years  the  more 
worthy  of  remark.1 

From  Ticinum  Yitellius  proceeded  to  Cremona,  and  there 
witnessed  the  contests  of  CsBcina’s  gladiators.  Thence  he 
Brutality  of  diverged  from  his  route  to  cross  the  plain  of  Be- 

SeMddof  driacum,  and  beheld  the  scene  of  his  victory,  still 

Bedriacum.  reeking  with  the  fumes  of  Roman  slaughter. 
The  curiosity  with  which  he  examined  the  spot  and  listened 


1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  68.  Yirginius  survived  to  his  83rd  year,  a.  d.  97.  The 
younger  Pliny  records  the  lines  which  he  directed  to  be  engraved  on  his  tomb, 
Ep.  vi.  10.,  Lx.  19. : 

“ Hie  situs  est  Rufus,  pulso  qui  Vindice  quondam 
Imperium  asseruit  non  sibi,  sed  patriae.” 

They  seem  to  contradict  the  statement  of  the  historian,  that  Yirginius  and 
Yindex  had  come  to  a mutual  understanding.  This  was  the  tradition  to  which 
Juvenal  also  refers : 

“ Quid  enim  Yirginius  armis 
Debuit  ulcisci  magis,  aut  cum  Yindice  Galba.” 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


S45 


to  the  details  of  the  bloody  fray,  shocked  the  narrators  of  his 
history : he  showed  no  remorse  for  the  death  of  so  many  of 
his  countrymen,  nor  horror  at  the  sight  of  their  remains. 
Some,  indeed,  declared  that  he  expressed  a brutal  pleasure  at 
the  scene ; the  corpse  of  an  enemy , he  said,  smells  always 
well,  particularly  of  a citizen,  Nevertheless,  he  fortified  his 
stomach  with  draughts  of  wine,  and  distributed  it  largely 
among  his  soldiers.  Tacitus  himself,  the  most  temperate  or 
least  fanciful  of  our  authorities,  allows  that  he  sacrificed  on 
the  field  to  the  Divinities  of  the  spot? 

The  shows  of  Yalens  at  Bononia  were  celebrated  with 
unusual  pomp,  the  whole  apparatus  of  imperial  luxury  being 
brought  for  the  purpose  from  Rome,  and  with  it  He  is  with  ^ 
the  worthless  instruments  of  Nero’s  debaucheries,  Je5?om  ra- 
the dancers,  singers,  and  eunuchs,  with  whom  a^rmedcon-33 
Yitellius  had  become  familiar  in  the  court  of  the  queror- 
tyrant.  As  he  approached  the  city  the  stream  of  applica- 
tion for  places  and  favours  met  him  with  accumulated  force ; 
it  was  necessary  to  abridge  the  short  tenure  of  the  desig- 
nated consuls  to  make  room  for  more  competitors,  and  some, 
whom  might  be  expected  to  put  up  with  an  affront,  were 
excluded  altogether.  The  news  which  now  arrived  of  the 
adhesion  of  the  Syrian  legions  dispelled  all  alarm,  and  gave 
the  rein  to  every  evil  passion.  The  emperor  and  the  army, 
with  no  fear  of  Vespasian  before  them,  might  indulge  them- 
selves without  restraint.  Yitellius  would  have  entered 
Rome  in  the  garb  of  war,  cloaked  and  booted,  at  the  head  of 
his  troops,  with  colours  flying  and  trumpets  blowing.  Such 
arrogance  would  have  been  unparalleled  : such  flagitiousness 
would  have  been  a prodigy.  Citizens  of  every  rank  stood 
aghast  at  this  vision  of  foreign  invasion  descried  dimly  in  the 
distance ; but  the  emperor’s  friends  interposed  at  the  last 
moment,  and  at  the  Milvian  bridge  he  consented  to  lay  down 
his  military  ensigns,  and  traversed  the  streets  in  the  civil 
prsetexta,  the  soldiers  following  with  sheathed  swords.2 

1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  70.  Comp.  Suet.  VUell.  10.;  Dion,  lxv.  1. 

2 Comp.  Tac.  Hist.  ii.  89.  with  Suet.  VUell.  11.  The  account  of  the  former 
is  undoubtedly  to  be  preferred. 


346 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


CHAPTER  LYII. 

ORIGIN  AND  EARLY  HISTORY  OF  VESPASIAN. — HE  IS  RECOMMENDED  TO  THE  SYRIAN 

LEGIONS  BY  MUCIANUS,  AND  PROCLAIMED  EMPEROR  IN  THE  EAST. HUCIANUS 

ADVANCES  TOWARDS  ITALY,  WHILE  VESPASIAN  OCCUPIES  EGYPT. — DISGRACEFUL 

CONDUCT  OF  VITELLIUS  AT  ROME. HE  IS  ABANDONED  OR  FEEBLY  SUPPORTED 

BY  HIS  PARTISANS. HIS  FORCES  DEFEATED  AT  BEDRIACUM. ANTONIUS  PRIMUS 

CROSSES  THE  APENNINES. VITELLIUS  OFFERS  TO  RESIGN  THE  EMPIRE,  BUT  IS 

PREVENTED  BY  HIS  SOLDIERS. THE  CAPITOL  ATTACKED  BY  THE  VITELLIANS 

AND  BURNT. PRIMUS  FORCES  HIS  WAY  INTO  ROME. VITELLIUS  SEIZED  AND 

SLAIN. VESPASIAN  ACCEPTED  AS  EMPEROR. MUCIANUS  CONDUCTS  THE  GOV- 
ERNMENT DURING  HIS  ABSENCE. STATE  OF  AFFAIRS  AT  ROME. COMMENCEMENT 

OF  THE  RESTORATION  OF  THE  CAPITOL. SUPERSTITIOUS  REVERENCE  PAID  TO 

THE  FLAVIAN  FAMILY. — PRETENDED  MIRACLES  OF  VESPASIAN  AT  ALEXANDRIA. 
HE  REACHES  ROME. A.  D.  69,  *70.  A.  U.  822,  823. 

TITUS  FLAVIUS  VESPASIANUS,  whose  career  we 
are  now  to  follow,  has  already  been  mentioned  as  an 
object  of  jealousy  to  Otho,  and  again  to  Vitel- 
reer  of  Yespa-  lius ; as  the  man,  however,  whose  rumoured 
adhesion  to  the  latest  revolution  seemed  to  estab- 
lish the  usurpation  of  the  adventurer  from  Germany.  The 
origin  of  this  redoubted  soldier  was  obscure  : his  family  be- 
longed to  the  Sabine  burgh  of  Reate,  and  had  never  risen  to 
public  honours.  Vespasian  had  no  illustrious  images  in  the 
modest  hall  of  his  fathers.  Arrived,  at  the  period  now  before 
us,  at  the  advanced  age  of  sixty,  he  had  passed  the  most 
active  portion  of  life  in  a variety  of  important  services.1  The 
favour  of  Narcissus  had  given  him  a legion  in  Britain,  where, 
as  we  have  seen,  he  had  performed  some  notable  exploits, 

1 Vespasian  was  born  at  Phalacrine,  a village  near  Reate;  but  his  grand- 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


347 


and  earned  the  triumphal  ornaments.  This  acknowledgment 
of  his  merits  was  followed,  still  perhaps  through  the  patron- 
age of  the  powerful  freedman,  by  two  priesthoods  and  the 
consulship  in  the  year  804.  In  the  prime  of  life,  and  at  the 
height  of  honour,  he  had  been  reduced  to  inaction  by  the 
jealousy  of  Agrippina,  who  hated  all  the  dependents  of  Nar- 
cissus ; and  it  was  not  till  her  fall  that  he  succeeded  to 
the  proconsulship  of  Africa,  which  he  exercised  in  1816. 
The  administration  of  Vespasian  had  the  rare  merit  of  bring- 
ing him  no  pecuniary  advantage.  He  left  the  province 
poorer  than  he  came  to  it ; but  he  confirmed  the  opinion  of 
his  prudence  and  firmness,  while  he  acquired  a character  for 
integrity.  His  circumstances,  thus  honourably  narrow,  in- 
duced him  to  turn,  on  quitting  office,  to  private  means  of 
maintaining  his  family.  He  became  a contractor  for  the 
beasts,  and  perhaps  for  the  slaves,  of  Africa,  destined  for  the 
Roman  market.  Following,  however,  in  the  train  of  Nero, 
during  that  prince’s  sojourn  in  Greece,  he  gave  offence,  and 
incurred  some  peril,  by  the  bluntness  of  his  manner.  It 
seems  that  he  could  not  always  keep  awake  through  the 
emperor’s  displays  of  singing  and  acting ; an  indecorum  in- 
tolerable to  the  vain  performer,  who  at  last  peevishly  dis- 
missed him.1  But  when  disturbances  began  to  arise  in  Judea, 
his  military  qualities  were  not  to  be  slighted.  Nero  intrusted 
him  with  the  government  of  Palestine,  and  the  command  of 

father,  the  first  mentioned  of  the  family,  was  a citizen  of  the  larger  town.  Suet. 
Vespas.  i.  2.  His  grandfather  was  named  T.  Flavius  Petro : 

T.  Flavius  Petro. 

T.  Flavius  Sabinus.  = Vespasia  Polla. 

Titus  (?)  Flavius  Sabinus.  T.  Flavius  Vespasianus  = Flavia  Domitilla. 

Flavius  Sabinus.  T.  Flavius  T.  Flavius  Domitilla. 

Vespasianus.  Domitianus. 

W e have  here  two  instances  of  the  practice,  common  at  the  time,  of  giving  the 
elder  son  the  father’s,  and  the  younger  the  mother’s,  cognomen.  See  also  Suet. 
Otho,  1.,  Vitell.  6.  Titus  seems  to  have  been  the  common  praenomen  of  all. 

1 The  story  is  told  by  Tacitus,  Ann.  xvi.  5.,  and  referred  to  by 'Suetonius, 
Vesp.  4. 


348 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  69. 


the  forces  soon  to  be  called  into  action  there.  His  temper 
was  prone  to  superstition.1 * *  His  advance  had  been  hitherto 
signal ; he  felt  confidence  in  his  own  abilities,  and  believed 
himself  a favourite  of  fortune ; he  was  surrounded,  like  every 
Homan  in  high  station  abroad,  by  flatterers,  who  nourished 
every  thought  of  pride  or  vanity,  and,  amidst  a nation  of 
fanatics,  prophets  were  not  wanting  to  apply  to  the  renowned 
Yespasianus  the  omens  which  were  supposed  popularly  to 
point  to  a Jewish  deliverer  and  Messiah.  The  successes  he 
gained  in  his  first  encounters  with  the  J ews  encouraged  him 
to  brood  over  these  shadowy  intimations ; and,  when  he 
visited  the  summit  of  Mount  Carmel  to  sacrifice  to  the  deity 
of  the  spot,  the  priests  declared,  on  inspecting  the  entrails, 
that  whatever  he  was  purposing,  whether  it  were  to  build  a 
house,  to  buy  an  estate,  or  to  increase  his  family  of  slaves, 
the  mansion  should  be  ample,  the  property  vast,  the  number 
of  his  dependents  unusually  great.  His  attendants,  aware 
of  the  ideas  he  was  beginning  to  harbour,  spread  this  oracular 
sentence  far  and  near,  and  the  eyes  of  the  soldiers  and  pro- 
vincials were  turned  more  freely  and  fixed  more  devoutly 
upon  the  sturdy  veteran  than  ever.  To  Nero,  to  Galba,  to 
Otho,  as  they  appeared  successively  on  the  scene,  he  frankly 
offered  his  own  and  his  soldiers’  obedience ; but  with  every 
change  of  dynasty,  his  submission  to  the  choice  of  the  capital 
was  more  and  more  shaken,  and  he  was  strongly  affected  by 
the  silence  with  which  the  oath  he  tendered  to  Yitellius  was 
received  by  the  troops  he  commanded.8 

Nevertheless  Yespasian,  with  the  discretion  which  became 
his  years  and  experience,  was  not  lightly  moved  to  enter  the 
Vespasian  re-  held  against  the  chief  accepted  at  Home.  Besides 
Syrian  ie-°  his  own  fortunes,  those  of  two  sons — Titus  and 
ciakned^mpe-  Bomitianus,  the  one  already  launched  in  the 
driaabrtheapre-  career  of  public  service,  the  other  just  entering 
feet  of  Egypt.  Upon  it — trembled  in  the  balance,  and  he  hesitat- 

1 Aurelius  Victor  says  of  him : “ Simul  divinis  deditus,  quorum  vera  pleris- 

que  negotiis  compererat.”  Ccesar.  9. 

8 Tac.  Hist.  i.  74. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


349 


ed  to  expose  their  brilliant  prospects  to  the  chances  of  a 
military  revolution.  He  well  knew,  as  a general,  the  valour 
of  the  Germanic  forces,  with  which  he  had  himself  served : 
perhaps  he  remembered  that,  at  least  since  the  times  of  Sulla, 
the  forces  of  the  East  had  never  measured  themselves  with 
success  against  the  hardier  warriors  of  the  Western  world. 
The  governor  of  Palestine,  moreover,  was  dependent  on  the 
higher  authority  and  wider  command  of  the  Syrian  proconsul. 
Yespasian  would  shrink  from  the  call  of  public  favour  while 
Mucianus  still  adhered  to  the  new  emperor,  however  loose 
and  reluctant  such  an  adherence  might  be.  But  when  Muci- 
anus himself  urged  him  to  the  enterprise,  and  offered  all  the 
weight  of  his  support,  hesitation  would  be  merely  pusillani- 
mous. After  several  private  conferences  to  which  he  was 
invited  on  the  borders  of  his  province,  the  proconsul  led  him 
to  the  cantonments  of  the  Syrian  army,  and  recommended 
his  cause  to  its  support.  He  was  received  with  enthusiasm. 
Men  and  officers,  impatient  at  the  superior  fortune  of  their 
rivals  in  the  West,  exulting  perhaps  in  the  prospect  of  re- 
turning in  triumph  to  Italy,  vied  with  one  another  in  urging 
their  favourite  to  action,  while  he  still  cautiously  restrained 
them  from  saluting  him  with  the  irrevocable  title  of  Emperor. 
Mucianus  returned  to  Antioch  to  complete  his  preparations  ; 
Yespasian  himself  in  his  own  head-quarters  at  Caesarea. 
Tiberius  Alexander,  Nero’s  prefect  in  Egypt,  declared  for 
the  new  competitor ; thus  securing  the  flank  of  his  position 
in  Palestine,  assuring  the  maintenance  of  his  troops  in  the 
East,  and  threatening  Rome  itself  with  the  loss  of  its  most 
plenteous  storehouse.  The  prefect,  indeed,  was  the  first  to 
invite  his  soldiers  to  proclaim  Yespasian  emperor:  it  was 
from  the  first  of  July,  the  day  of  this  solemn  inauguration  at 
Alexandria,  that  the  annals  of  the  new  principate  were  after- 
wards dated.1  The  Judean  legions  followed,  on  the  third  of 
the  same  month,  with  the  ardour  of  a common  instinct.  The 

Tac.  Hist.  ii.  29. ; Suet.  Vesp.  6.  The  second  date  (v.  non.  Jul.)  is  taken 
from  Tacitus,  and  is  preferable  to  that  given  by  Suetonius  (v.  Id.  Jul.,  i.  e.  the 
11th.) 


350 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


word  Imperator  was  first  dropped,  as  it  were,  by  accident : 
it  was  immediately  caught  up,  passed  from  rank  to  rank,  and 
finally  ratified  by  the  unanimous  acclamations  of  the  whole 
army.  The  titles  of  Caesar  and  Augustus  were  speedily  added. 
Mucianus  was  prepared  for  action.  As  soon  as  the  report 
arrived  at  Antioch,  he  proposed  the  oath  to  his  legions  there, 
and,  proceeding  to  the  theatre,  harangued  the  people  fluently 
in  Greek,  with  a grace  which  charmed  them  : to  the  soldiers 
he  represented  that  Vitellius  had  resolved  to  quarter  his 
Gauls  and  Germans  in  the  luxurious  stations  of  Syria,  and 
transfer  to  the  savage  North  the  troops  which  had  revelled 
so  long  in  the  pleasures  of  Asia.  The  provincials  were  terri- 
fied at  the  prospect  of  this  settlement  of  barbarians  among 
them ; the  soldiers  were  not  only  alarmed  but  exasperated.1 

By  the  15th  of  July  all  the  legions  of  Syria  and  the  east- 
ern frontier  had  pledged  themselves  to  the  new  aspirant. 
Preparations  They  were  supported  by  the  vassals  or  allies  of 
for'onS'ng  the  empire ; by  Soliemus,  king  of  Itursea ; by 
the  empire.  Antiochus,  king  of  Commagene ; by  Agrippa,  a 
younger  son  of  Herod,  the  nominal  sovereign  of  some  petty 
districts  of  Palestine,  long  retained  at  Rome,  whence  he  had 
managed,  on  the  news  of  the  impending  revolution,  to  es- 
cape to  his  own  dominions ; and  by  his  sister  Berenice,  queen 
of  Chalcis,  intriguing  and  beautiful,  and  in  favour  with  Ves- 
pasian, old  as  he  was.  From  Achaia  to  Armenia,  all  the 
provinces  of  the  East  followed  the  common  impulse,  to  range 
the  eastern  half  of  the  empire  against  the  western.  Mucia- 
nus summoned  his  chief  adherents  to  a meeting  at  Berytus. 
Money  was  demanded,  levies  were  ordered,  garrisons  station- 
ed, magazines  and  arsenals  established.  A base  was  laid  for 
extensive  and  prolonged  operations.  Vespasian  was  full  of 
activity,  lavishing  exhortations  or  praises,  as  each  were  re- 
quired ; paying  court  to  the  senators  resident  in  the  prov- 
ince ; engaging  the  Parthians  and  Armenians  to  respect  the 
frontiers ; laborious,  vigilant,  discreet  in  all  things  ; showing 


1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  '74-78. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


351 


himself  fit  to  wield  the  empire  by  the  firmness  with  which 
he  withheld  from  the  soldiers  any  extravagant  largess.  Titus 
was  charged  with  the  conduct  of  affairs  in  Judea,  while  he 
undertook  himself  to  secure  the  footing  promised  him  in 
Egypt.  The  forces  of  the  East  were  divided  into  three  armies ; 
one  of  these  was  deemed  sufficient  to  confront  the  legions  of 
Vitellius ; the  second  was  destined  to  control  revolt  within 
the  frontiers  ; the  third  to  repress  aggression  from  beyond 
them.  The  new  emperor  made  preparations  for  maintaining 
the  integrity  of  the  empire  at  the  moment  when  he  was  bend- 
ing all  his  energies  to  acquire  it ; such  had  been  the  policy 
which  gained  favour  and  admiration  for  Augustus ; Senate, 
People , and  Gods , would  declare,  as  of  old,  for  the  man  who 
devoted  himself  to  the  true  interests  of  the  republic ; even 
the  prtetorians  would  acknowledge  him  as  their  legitimate 
chief,  and  break  their  unworthy  bondage  to  a selfish  volup- 
tuary.1 

Mucianus  led  the  van  with  deliberate  and  majestic  march, 
neither  hurrying  forwards,  as  if  anxious  or  impatient,  nor 
loitering,  as  if  indifferent  to  success.  The  strong 

, „ , , & Mucianus  ad- 

CUrrent  swept  all  lesser  bodies  into  its  vortex,  vances  west- 

Officers,  military  and  civil;  Romans  and  provin-  ceives  power- 
cials,  ships  and  soldiers,  arms  and  treasures,  1 support 
were  all  wafted  along  in  a stream  of  increasing  weight  and 
volume.  Money , said  Mucianus,  is  the  sinews  of  civil  war.2 * * * 
An  invader  might  throw  himself  on  the  enemy’s  country  for 
support ; but  the  leader  of  a party  must  depend  on  a well- 
filled  military  chest.  Of  his  own  means  he  gave  largely ; 
but  he  was  not  more  abstinent  than  the  chiefs  of  former  rev- 
olutions in  requiring  contributions  from  his  adherents,  or  ex- 
torting treasure  from  the  temples  and  other  public  sources. 
The  tide  of  arms  rolled  away ; but  the  taxes  now  imposed 

1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  79-83. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  84. : “Eos  esse  belli  civilis  nervos.”  We  have  adopted  the 

phrase  as  a rhetorical  commonplace,  applying  it  to  war  in  general ; but  our  au- 

thor is  more  precise.  The  metaphor,  however,  had  already  been  employed  by 

Cicero  ( Philipp . v.  2.):  “nervi  civilis  belli  pecunia  infinita.” 


352 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


by  Vespasian’s  lieutenant  were  transferred  as  the  legacy  of 
war  to  the  peace  which  followed;  for  Vespasian  himself, 
though  averse  in  the  first  instance  do  imposing  them,  was  too 
well  satisfied  with  their  returns  ever  to  remit  them.  And 
now  three  Illyrian  legions  joined ; the  Third,  the  Eighth, 
and  the  Seventh  or  Claudian,  faithful  to  Otho  as  the  friend 
of  Nero,  and  heir  to  the  fortunes  of  the  family  from  which 
it  derived  its  title.1  These  legions  had  advanced  as  far  as 
Aquileia  to  fight  for  their  favourite,  and  on  hearing  of  his 
death,  stoned  the  bearer  of  the  news,  tore  the  colours  which 
bore  the  name  of  Vitellius,  sacked  the  military  chest,  and 
impetuously  defied  the  conqueror.  They  now  rejoiced  in  the 
opportunity  of  transferring  themselves  to  Vespasian,  and 
speedily  brought  over  to  him  two  other  legions  stationed  in 
Pannonia,  which  were  followed  by  the  garrisons  of  Dalmatia. 
The  seeds  of  still  further  defection  were  scattered  by  letters 
to  the  troops  in  Spain  and  Gaul,  and  particularly  to  the 
Fourteenth  legion,  now  sullenly  retiring  towards  Britain.2 

At  the  moment  that  the  army  in  Syria  was  proclaiming 
Vespasian  emperor,  Vitellius  was  making  his  entry  into 
Rome,  at  the  head  of  four  legions,  twelve  squad- 

Conduct  of  Vi-  ’ _ _ . . _ & ’ ...  / 

teiiius  at  rons  ot  horse,  and  thirty-lour  auxiliary  cohorts, 
a veteran  force  of  sixty  thousand  men,  but  cor- 
rupted by  three  months  of  licence.  His  first  act  was  to 
sacrifice  in  the  Capitol,  and  there  he  embraced  his  mother, 
on  whom  he  pressed  the  title  of  Augusta  : the  next  day  he 
harangued  the  people  and  senate,  in  the  strain  of  a foreign 
conqueror  rather  than  of  a citizen,  with  much  ill-merited  praise 
of  his  own  moderation  and  vigilance.  His  career,  however, 
in  the  city  was  attended  from  the  first  with  evil  omens.  The 
first  edict  he  issued  as  Chief  Pontiff  was  dated  the  15th 
kalends  of  August  (July  18th),  the  day  of  the  Allia  and  Cre- 
mera.3  Yet  his  behaviour  in  the  Senate-house,  the  forum, 

1 The  name  of  Claudian  was  given,  as  may  be  remembered,  to  this  legion 

as  a reward  for  its  zeal  in  suppressing  the  revolt  of  Scribonianus.  See  above 
chap.  xlix.  2 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  85,  86. ; Suet.  Vesp.  6. 

3 Tac.  Hist  ii.  91.;  Suet.  VUell.  11. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


353 


and  the  theatre,  seems  to  have  been  modest  and  becoming. 
He  was  assiduous  in  attending  the  dissussions  of  the  fathers, 
even  on  matters  of  trifling  concern.  He  suffered  himself  to 
be  opposed,  or  was  satisfied,  if  warmly  attacked,  with  invok- 
ing the  protection  of  the  tribunes.  Even  then  he  soon  re- 
covered his  composure,  and  would  only  remark  that  it  was 
nothing  new  or  strange  for  two  senators  to  differ ; for  his 
own  part , he  would  add,  he  had  sometimes  disagreed  with 
Thrasea.  The  comparison  thus  implied  between  the  sage 
and  the  profligate,  the  patriot  and  the  usurper,  provoked  some 
bitter  derision.  But  this  outward  moderation  betokened 
only  the  easy  compliance  of  his  character.  Caecina  and  V a- 
lens,  it  was  soon  found,  were  the  real  governors  of  the  em- 
pire. The  chief  appointments  were  all  made  through  their 
influence,  which  they  exerted  with  mutual  rivalry.  They 
enriched  themselves  at  the  same  time  with  the  estates  and 
houses  both  of  friends  and  enemies,  while  the  decrees  for 
restoring  their  possessions  to  the  recalled  exiles  were  gen- 
erally allowed  to  be  frustrated.  They  studied  to  engross  their 
master  in  the  low  debauchery  to  which  he  was  naturally  ad- 
dicted, while  they  took  the  cares  of  empire  off  his  hands. 
He  passed  his  days  and  nights  in  feasting  and  sleeping,  and 
while  the  treasury  was  empty,  and  the  promised  donative 
could  not  be  discharged,  he  lavished  all  the  money  he  could 
grasp  in  the  indulgence  of  the  coarsest  appetites.  Within 
the  few  months  of  his  power  he  spent,  as  was  computed, 
nine  hundred  millions  of  sesterces,  above  seven  millions  of 
our  money,  in  vulgar  and  brutal  sensuality.1  But  the  sol- 

1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  95. : “ Novies  millies  sestertium  paucissimis  mensibus  inter- 
vertisse  creditur.”  The  Romans  were  generally  content  with  a single  meal,  the 
coena : the  slight  refections  of  the  morning  and  midday,  jentaculum  and  pran. 
dium,  were  rarely  taken  in  company.  But  Yitellius  had  his  banquets  thrice  or 
four  times  in  the  day,  adding  to  the  above  named,  a comissatio,  or  “Tevel,”  at 
night.  To  the  abstemious  people  of  the  South  such  gluttony  seemed  prodigious ; 
but  Yitellius  had  recourse  to  the  vomit.  His  brother  gave  him  a supper  in 
which  2000  fishes  and  7000  birds  were  served  up.  Yitellius  had  an  immense 
dish  made,  which  he  called  the  “ Shield  of  Minerva,”  and  loaded  with  peacocks’ 
and  pheasants’  tongues,  and  roes  of  the  mullet  and  scarus : his  delicacies  were 
vol.  vi. — 23 


354 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


diers,  defrauded  of  their  stipulated  reward,  required  other 
compensation,  and  they  were  permitted  to  range  the  city 
freely,  and  taste  its  amusements  and  dissipations,  to  the  ruin 
of  their  habits  and  discipline.  The  praetorians  had  been  dis- 
banded, and  the  ordinary  police  of  the  city  was  neglected. 
The  legionaries  chose  their  own  quarters  at  will,  and  when 
these  rude  children  of  the  North  stretched  their  tents  on  the 
pleasant  but  unhealthy  slopes  of  the  Vatican,  they  suffered 
severely  from  intemperance  in  food  and  bathing,  as  well  as 
from  the  malaria  of  the  spot.  It  became  necessary  to  re-em- 
body  the  praetorian  and  the  urban  guards.  Valens  took  this 
important  charge  on  himself  to  the  exclusion  of  his  colleague. 
He  drafted  twenty  thousand  of  the  legionaries  into  these 
favoured  bands  ; but  the  legions  were  left  thereby  not  weak- 
ened only,  but  discontented.  They  were  to  be  gratified  in 
their  turn  with  fresh  indulgences.  Vitellius  conceded  to 
them  the  execution  of  three  Gaulish  nobles  who  had  fought 
for  Vindex  ; so  far  back  did  their  animosity  reach.  The  em- 
peror’s birthday  was  celebrated  with  an  immense  show  of 
gladiators,  and  Nero’s  obsequies  were  performed  in  the  Cam- 
pus Martius.  The  tyrant’s  body  was  removed  from  the  sar- 
cophagus in  which  it  had  been  deposited,  and  laid  on  a funeral 
pyre.1  The  Augustales  applied  the  torch,  and  the  ashes,  I 
presume,  of  the  last  of  the  Julii  were  finally  consigned  to 
the  mausoleum  of  Augustus.  The  reign  of  the  freedmen  re- 
commenced ; Asiaticus  and  Polycletus,  such  were  the  names 
of  the  creatures  of  Vitellius,  recalled  by  their  avarice  and 
audacify  the  memory  of  the  favourites  of  Claudius.  The 
degradation  of  Home,  hardly  awakened  from  its  dream  of  in- 

brought  him  from  the  Caspian  and  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar.  Comp,  for  these 
and  other  extravagancies,  Suet.  Vitell.  13. ; Pliny,  Hist.  Nat.  xxxv.  46. ; Dion, 
lxv.  3. 

1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  95. ; Suet.  Vitell.  11.  The  author  quoted  by  Suidas  in  voc. 
BiTfA/Uof,  says  expressly  that  the  corpse,  veicpde,  of  Nero,  was  removed  from 
its  original  sepulchre.  But  this  sepulchre  was  not  the  obscure  place  he  sup* 
poses.  Suetonius  describes  it,  on  the  contrary,  as  a sarcophagus  (solium)  of 
porphyry,  crowned  with  an  altar-slab  of  white  Carrara  marble,  and  inclosed  in  a 
vault  of  Thasian  stone.  Ner.  50. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


355 


dependence,  was  as  complete  as  it  was  sudden,  and  never  yet 
perhaps  had  she  sunk  so  low  in  sensuality  and  licentiousness, 
as  in  the  few  months  which  followed  on  the  death  of  Otho. 

The  spell  was  broken  by  the  first  cry  of  military  defec- 
tion. The  Third  legion,  it  was  announced,  had  revolted,  but 
the  whole  truth  was  still  withheld  from  the  public  yiteiiiu8  iS  de- 
ear. Aid  was  hastily  summoned  from  Spain,  ®®r*°tde ™ 
Britain,  and  Germany.  But  the  provinces  were  JJ P'th. 

unmoved,  and  the  chiefs  of  the  legions  hesitated.  ers- 
Hordeonius  pleaded  that  he  was  threatened  by  the  Batavi, 
and  could  not  spare  troops ; Bolanus,  beyond  the  channel, 
that  he  was  fully  occupied  with  the  defence  of  his  posts  on 
the  Trent  and  Severn.  Spain  had  no  chief  of  consular  rank, 
and  her  officers  were  too  jealous  one  of  another  to  take  a step 
in  advance.  Africa  alone  responded  cheerfully.  The  indo- 
lence of  Vitellius  had  made  him  a favourite  with  the  troops 
he  had  formerly  commanded  there,  whereas  Vespasian’s  strict- 
ness had  offended  them,  and  they  remembered  having  once 
pelted  him  on  his  tribunal  with  turnips.1  The  adhesion  of 
the  African  province  was  undoubtedly  of  great  importance 
to  balance  the  defection  of  Egypt ; but  in  this  crisis,  when 
all  depended  on  the  strength  and  number  of  the  allies  which 
could  be  mustered  on  either  side,  the  elements  themselves 
conspired  against  the  doomed  Vitellius.  A long  prevalence 
of  north-westerly  winds,  bore  to  Greece  and  Asia  intelligence 
of  the  movements  of  the  one  party,  while  it  withheld  from 
Italy  all  accounts  of  the  operations  of  the  other.  The  occu- 
pation of  Illyricum  and  Rhsetia  by  Vespasian’s  adherents, 
enabled  him  at  the  same  time  to  close  the  communications  by 
land.  Vitellius  continued  long  to  indulge  in  fatal  security. 
At  last  the  imminence  of  danger  could  not  be  disguised. 
Valens  and  Csecina  were  despatched  to  the  north  of  Italy, 
and  with  them  marched  the  languid  and  broken  remnants  of 
the  Germanic  legions  : their  ranks  were  thin ; their  pace  was 
slow ; their  arms  rusty  or  decayed ; even  their  horses  were 


1 Suet.  Vesp.  4. 


356 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


out  of  condition : they  shrank  from  the  heat,  the  dust,  and 
the  wind ; nor  did  they  hear  the  restraints  of  discipline  bet- 
ter than  the  toils  of  service.  Valens  lingered  some  time  be- 
hind, under  the  plea  of  illness : Csecina,  it  was  believed,  al- 
ready meditated  defection ; certainly  he  was  jealous  of  his 
colleague’s  influence,  and  might  hope  for  more  consideration 
under  another  master.  The  Vitellian  forces  were  at  last  as- 
sembled in  the  plains  of  the  lower  Po,  between  Cremona  and 
Ravenna,  and  there  Csecina  began  to  corrupt  the  fidelity  of 
the  men  and  their  officers,  with  the  aid  of  Bassus,  prefect  of 
the  Adriatic  fleet,  whose  influence  extended  to  the  marine 
cohorts,  still  mindful  of  Galba’s  severity,  and  of  Otho’s  fa- 
vours.1 

The  three  Flavian  legions, — such  is  the  title  we  may  give 
to  the  adherents  of  Yespasian, — which  had  now  seized  the 
Antonius  Pri-  passes  of  the  Julian  Alps,  and  were  preparing  to 
piSforleT  Pour  down  int0  Italy>  were  commanded  by  An- 
into  Italy.  tonius  Primus.  While  some  of  his  officers  ad- 
vised delay,  to  await  the  arrival  of  Mucianus,  this  spirited 
partisan  would  listen  to  no  such  timid  counsels.  He  was 
anxious  to  be  the  first  of  his  faction  in  the  field.  He  despised 
the  adversary  before  him ; perhaps  he  had  secret  communica- 
tions with  Csecina.  Nevertheless,  his  strength  was  much  in- 
ferior to  that  of  the  enemy,  and  the  resolution  to  rush  head- 
long into  the  midst  of  them  seems  rash  and  precipitate.  But 
the  first  engagements  that  occurred  were  favourable  to  the 
invaders.  The  outposts  of  the  Vitellians  were  driven  back 
from  the  head  of  the  Adriatic.  The  Flavians  crossed  the 
deep  and  rapid  rivers,  and  turned  or  carried  every  fortress, 
till  they  arrived  before  Yerona,  and  spread  their  numerous 
and  well-appointed  cavalry  over  the  broad  plains  around  it. 
Here  indeed  Csecina,  it  seems,  might,  if  he  chose,  have  over- 
whelmed them ; but  he  contented  himself  with  issuing  mani- 
festos against  their  chief;  nor  in  these  did  he  exhibit  much 
confidence.  Antonius  retorted  in  a bolder  strain.  He  was 


1 Tac.  Hist.  ii.  101. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


357 


overtaken  by  letters  from  Mucianus,  rebuking  bis  baste  and 
requiring  him  to  wait  for  the  reinforcements.  Vespasian,  too, 
announced  that  be  was  in  possession  of  Egypt,  and  could  re- 
duce Vitellius  to  capitulate,  by  withholding  her  supplies  from 
Rome.  But  Primus  retained  his  confidence,  and  determined 
to  win  the  victory  alone.  The  legates  of  two  legions  shared 
his  authority,  and  encumbered  his  schemes : an  opportune 
revolt  of  their  soldiers,  fomented  perhaps  by  himself,  enabled 
him  to  remove  them  from  the  camp,  under  pretence  of  pro- 
viding for  their  security.  He  was  now  sole  commander,  and 
eager  to  push  his  advantage.  The  defection  of  the  fleet  at 
Ravenna  from  Vitellius  increased  his  ardour.  Caecina  would 
have  played  into  his  hands,  but  was  prevented  from  consum- 
mating the  treachery  by  his  own  soldiers ; and  now  both 
armies  prepared  for  a decisive  action  on  the  plain  of  Bedri- 
acum,  where  the  Vitellians,  amidst  all  their  pres- 

■i  A-iid  defeats  Ph  o 

ent  discouragements,  were  inspired  with  the  re-  vitellians  at 
collection  of  recent  triumph.  Left  without  a 
general  themselves,  for  they  had  thrown  Caecina  into  chains, 
they  were  opposed  to  a bold  and  able  leader,  and,  as  on  the 
former  occasion,  victory  now  declared  for  the  army  which 
was  best  commanded.  The  Flavians  were  twice  saved  from 
defeat  by  the  energy  of  Primus ; and  when  at  last  Cremona 
fell  into  their  hands,  the  remnant  of  the  Vitellian  legions 
broke  and  dispersed  in  all  directions.1 

Cremona  was  a Roman  colony,  established  as  a check 
upon  the  Gauls  of  the  Cisalpine,  and  a barrier  against  more 
distant  invaders.  Well  placed  on  a navigable  stream  amidst 
a fertile  country,  it  rapidly  increased  in  numbers  and  import- 
ance ; but  its  wealth  had  tempted  once  before  the  cupidity 
of  a conqueror,  and  it  deserved  under  the  Triumvirs  the 
epithet  of  hapless , which  was  now  to  become  more  terribly 
appropriate.2  Unscrupulous  as  the  Romans  had  ever  shown 
themselves  in  spoiling  foes,  or  even  dependents  and  allies, 
they  had  rarely,  even  in  the  worst  licence  of  civil  conflict, 

1 Tac.  Hist.  in.  15-35. ; Suet.  Vitell.  15. ; Dion,  lxv.  10-15. 

3 Virg.  Eel.  ix.  28. : “ Miser®  vicina  Cremonas.” 


358 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


surrendered  their  own  colonies  to  the  fate  of  war.  But  the 
example  of  Prceneste  under  Sulla  was  now  to  he  repeated, 
with  at  least  equal  horrors.  After  a brave  defence,  the  camp 
of  the  Vitellians  had  been  forced ; the  town  had  capitulated 
with  an  assurance  of  protection.  But  Primus,  as  an  intrigu- 
er and  adventurer,  had  bought  the  swords  of  his  soldiers 
by  hopes  which  he  had  not  yet  redeemed.  They  awaited 
impatiently  a word  or  gesture  to  commence  the  work  of 
plunder,  possibly  they  had  already  commenced  it ; and  when, 
in  taking  a bath  after  the  fatigues  of  the  attack,  he  remarked 
that  the  water  was  not  warm  enough,  the  words  of  the  at- 
tendant, It  shall  soon  be  hotter , were  caught  up  by  the  troops 
around  him,  and  perverted  into  an  order,  or  accepted  as  an 
omen,  for  burning  the  city.  Cremona  was  sacked  with  every 
aggravation  of  cruelty  and  brutality ; her  people  were  abus- 
ed and  slaughtered ; her  buildings  levelled  with  the  ground ; 
one  edifice  alone,  the  temple  of  Mephitis,  the  deity  of  the  sur- 
rounding marshes,  escaped  the  indiscriminate  destruction.1 2 

1 3ut  Vitellius , says  Tacitus,  after  the  departure  of  Ccecina, 
and  presently  of  Valens,  drowned  his  cares  in  voluptuous - 
Bestiality  of  ness  •*  either  collected  arms , nor  harangued  or 
fearf.hcrueSes  trained  his  soldiers , nor  showed  himself  every- 
and  disasters,  where  in  public  / but  burying  himself  in  the  shade 
of  his  gardens , like  those  slothful  brutes , which , if  you  give 
them  food,  lie  still  and  slumber , left  the  present,  the  imminent, 
and  the  distant,  all  in  the  same  forgetfulness?  He  was  loung- 
ing lazily  in  the  groves  of  Aricia  when  the  defection  of  his 
fleet  was  announced  to  him,  and  struck  him  with  consterna- 
tion. The  treachery  of  Caecina  followed;  but  in  this  case 
his  alarm  was  relieved  by  learning  that  the  traitor  was  cap- 
tured and  detained.  Nevertheless  his  spirits  were  depressed, 
and  all  courage  and  confidence  soon  failed  him.  Trembling 
and  suspicious,  he  was  easily  impelled  to  cruelty.  To  his 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  33. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  36. : “ Umbraculis  hortorum  abditus,  ut  ignava  animalia, 
quibus  si  cibum  suggeras,  jacent  torpentque,  praeterita,  instantia,  futura,  pari 
oblivione  dimiserat.” 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


359 


fears  he  sacrificed  a man  of  high  distinction,  Junius  BIsbsus, 
who  it  seems  had  allowed  himself,  in  this  crisis,  to  hold  a 
banquet  in  his  house.  He  was  accused  of  treasonable  aspir- 
ations. His  Junian  and  Antonian  blood  were  held  sufficient 
to  condemn  him.  Vitellius  caused  him  to  be  poisoned,  then 
visited  and  affected  to  condole  with  him  in  his  sickness,  re- 
marking afterwards  that  he  had  feasted  his  eyes  with  the 
sight  of  a dying  enemy.  The  deed,  the  motive,  and  the  man- 
ner, as  reported  by  common  fame,  were  treasured  up  by  the 
affronted  nobles  of  Rome,  to  whose  indignation  we  may  per- 
haps ascribe  a part  at  least  of  the  stories  y^hich  have  stamped 
Vitellius  as  the  most  bestial  of  tyrants.1  Valens  meanwhile, 
finding,  as  he  advanced  towards  the  Cisalpine,  that  the  coun- 
try was  in  the  hands  of  the  Flavians,  and  perceiving  that  the 
reinforcements  he  brought  with  him  were  too  few  to  over- 
come, too  numerous  to  pass  them  unperceived,  sent  on  his 
main  body  to  Ariminum,  to  do  the  best  they  could  for  them- 
selves ; but  turned  aside  himself  with  a few  followers  only, 
crossed  the  Apennines,  and  hearing  of  the  capture  of  Cre- 
mona, took  ship  at  Pisse,  intending  to  throw  himself  into  the 
FTarbonensis,  and  organize  the  Vitellians  in  the  province. 
Adverse  winds  compelled  him  to  land  at  the  Portus  Monceci. 
The  coast  was  occupied  by  Valerius  Paulinus,  a Flavian.  The 
treacherous  sea  seemed  less  hostile  than  the  land,  and  Valens 
launched  again  upon  the  waves.  Once  more  he  was  driven 
ashore  on  the  islands  called  Stcechades,  and  was  made  pris- 
oner. The  news  of  these  losses  spread  rapidly  through  the 
West,  and  Spain,  Gaul,  and  Britain  declared  without  reserve 
in  favour  of  Vespasian.2 

The  withdrawal  of  numerous  battalions  from  the  defence 
of  the  frontiers  gave  the  barbarians,  in  many  quarters,  an 
opportunity  which  they  did  not  fail  to  seize.  In 

. . . . Slow  and  cau- 

Bntam,  m Germany,  in  Dacia,  the  outposts  of  tious  policy  of 

J \ „ Vespasian. 

the  empire  were  attacked,  and  the  majesty  of 

1 The  charge  against  Yitellius  of  setting  up  Nero  openly  as  his  pattern  in 
the  empire  (see  Suet.  Vitell.  11.),  has  the  air  of  a senatorial  misrepresentation. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  44. 


360 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


Rome  insulted.  But  of  these  petty  disturbances  I will  not 
pause  to  speak  here.  The  aggressions  of  the  Dacians,  which 
alone  could  have  had  any  effect  in  checking  the  progress  of 
the  Flavian  generals,  were  repressed  by  Mucianus,  the  victory 
at  Cremona  coming  opportunely  to  release  one  of  his  legions 
from  the  necessity  of  facing  the  Vitellians.  At  the  same 
time,  the  attention  of  Vespasian  was  recalled  from  his  great 
enterprise  by  a movement  on  the  far  distant  shores  of  the 
Euxine,  and  he  paused  to  detach  a force  to  Trapezus,  to  check 
the  revolt  of  an  ambitious  freedman.  Success  in  this  quarter, 
and  victory  in  Italy,  were  announced  to  him  at  the  same 
moment.  He  hastened  his  march  towards  Alexandria,  with 
the  avowed  purpose  of  threatening  Rome  with  famine.  His 
plan  was  to  advance  from  Egypt,  by  land  and  sea,  into  the 
province  of  Africa,  and  grasp  both  the  granaries  of  Italy. 
Yet  this  slow  and  wary  policy  was  not  without  its  dangers. 
Amidst  the  chances  of  civil  war,  swiftness  of  movement  is 
generally  the  first  condition  of  success.  Hew  perils  multiply 
at  every  step.  Foes  may  be  routed,  but  at  the  next  moment 
friends  may  become  foes.  The  triumphs  of  Primus  had  al- 
ready turned  his  head.  He  thought  the  question  between 
the  rival  emperors  decided,  and  by  himself  alone.  Uncon- 
trolled by  a superior  on  the  spot,  he  acted  for  himself  and  his  le- 
gions as  though  he  were  king  of  Italy,  extorting  and  plundering 
at  his  own  pleasure,  and  repelling,  not  without  scorn,  the  re- 
bukes of  Mucianus,  while  his  despatches  even  to  Vespasian 
were  composed  in  the  spirit  of  an  equal  rather  than  a subject. 
But  Primus,  adroit  as  a chief  of  freebooters  in  managing  the 
temper  of  his  soldiers,  was  no  match  in  policy  for  statesmen 
and  imperators.1 

Vitellius  was  still  at  Rome,  still  grovelling  in  his  sensual- 
ity, refusing  even  to  credit  the  account  of  his  disasters.  He 
vitellius  puts  forbade  the  subject  to  be  discussed,  and  sup- 
head  of  histhe  Presse(l,  as  far  as  he  could,  the  reports  which  cir- 
forces.  culated  about  it.  The  Flavian  generals  sent  him 


1 Tac.  Hist,  iii.  45-53. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


361 


back  their  prisoners,  that  he  might  know  the  truth  from  the 
mouths  of  actual  witnesses.  Yitellius  saw,  interrogated,  and 
immediately  executed  them.  A brave  centurion  extorted  his 
leave  to  visit  the  scene  of  warfare,  and  ascertain  the  state  of 
affairs ; but,  spurned  and  insulted  on  his  return  by  his  infat- 
uated chief,  he  threw  himself  indignantly  on  his  sword.  At 
last,  Yitellius  roused  himself  to  despatch  fourteen  praetorian 
cohorts,  with  a legion  of  marines,  and  some  squadrons  of 
horse,  to  occupy  the  passes  of  the  Apennines.  He  placed  his 
brother  Lucius  in  command  of  the  city,  and  made  some  faint 
efforts  to  conciliate  the  nobles  by  the  appointment  of  consuls 
for  several  years  forward.  At  the  same  time  he  conferred 
the  Latin  privileges  upon  allies  and  subjects,  reckless  of  the 
future  condition  of  the  realm  which  was  passing  so  rapidly 
from  his  hands.  Finally,  he  advanced  in  person,  at  the  im- 
patient demand  of  his  soldiers,  to  the  camp  at  Mevania,  at 
the  foot  of  the  mountains  which  constituted  the  last  barrier 
between  Rome  and  the  invaders.1 

But  now  a fresh  mishap  befell  him.  The  fleet  at  Mise- 
num,  the  guard  or  convoy  of  the  corn-fleets,  revolted : the 
sailors  on  board,  moreover,  were  trained  to  act  on  He  suffers  re_ 
land,  and  they  provoked  an  insurrection  against  Jackupon  falls 
him  in  Campania.  Capua,  with  its  schools  of  Eome- 
gladiators,  held  out  for  Yitellius,  while  the  patrician  retreat 
of  Puteoli  declared  against  him.  The  first  officer  he  sent  to 
check  this  movement  went  over,  with  his  forces,  to  the  ene- 
my ; and  the  Flavian  partisans,  thus  increased  in  strength 
and  numbers,  occupied  the  walls  of  Tarracina.  Yitellius, 
in  dismay  and  consternation,  now  drew  his  troops  nearer  to 
Rome,  leaving  the  Apennines  open  to  the  enemy,  and  sought, 
by  frantic  promises  and  entreaties,  to  induce  the  senators, 
the  knights,  and  even  the  lowest  of  the  citizens,  to  offer  men, 
arms,  and  money  in  aid  of  his  falling  fortunes.  The  news 
of  the  rising  in  Campania  roused  the  Marsians,  the  Pelig- 
nians,  and  the  Samnites.2  The  heart  of  Italy  was  more  ex- 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  54,  55. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  59. : “ Erectus  Samnis,  Pelignusque,  et  Marsi,  aemulatione 


362 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


(A.  D.  69. 


cited  by  the  personal  struggle  of  two  obscure  adventurers 
than  by  the  war  of  classes  in  the  last  age  of  the  republic. 
The  cold  and  wet  of  the  winter  season,  which  had  now  set 
in,  was  the  last  ally  of  Vitellius;  and  the  difficulty  with 
which  Antonius  at  length  overcame  this  mountain  barrier, 
though  unopposed,  showed  how  easily  the  emperor  might 
have  checked  and  perhaps  destroyed  him  in  the 

Antonins  cross-  _ _ 

es  the  Apen-  attempt.  .But  the  passage  was  now  effected  : the 

two  armies  confronted  each  other  in  the  valley 
of  the  N ar.  Deserted  by  their  emperor,  and  without  a leader, 
the  Vitellians  had  no  spirit  for  fighting.  The  head  of  Yalens, 
kept  some  time  in  custody,  and  now  slain  at  Urbinum,  was 
exhibited  to  them : a trophy  which  awed  them  into  submis- 
sion. Antonius  received  them  with  clemency,  and  breaking 
them  in  two  divisions  for  greater  security,  was  content  with 
setting  watch  over  their  movements,  and  suffered  them  to 
retain  their  arms.  He  then  proceeded  to  offer  terms  to  Vi- 
telline himself,  promising  him  life,  large  revenues,  and  a quiet 
retreat  in  Campania,  as  the  reward  of  submission.  These 
offers  were  confirmed  by  Mucianus.  Vitellius,  stunned  by 
his  misfortunes,  passively  acquiesced.  Had  not  the  foe,  says 
Tacitus,  remembered  that  he  had  once  been  emperor,  he 
would  himself  have  forgotten  it.  It  is  gratifying,  however, 
to  find  that  in  the  heat  of  a Roman  civil  war,  one  rival  could 
make  such  assurances  of  clemency,  and  the  other  could  con- 
fide in  them.1 

Nevertheless  the  advent  of  Primus  and  his  plundering 
legions  was  anticipated  with  horror  by  the  chief  citizens. 

Their  object  was  to  save  Rome,  whatever  else 

Vitellius  offers  * ..  .. 

to  resign  the  might  happen,  irom  the  licence  oi  an  invading 

empire,  but  is  ..  ..  ..  . . , 

prevented  by  army.  Vitellius  had  retained  m the  city,  ob- 
served, but  not  guarded,  the  brother  and  the 
younger  son  of  his  rival.  Fear  for  himself  and  for  his  own 
family,  as  in  Otho’s  case,  had  introduced  this  new  feature  of 


quod  Campania  praevenisset,  ut  in  novo  obsequio,  ad  cuncta  belli  munia  acres 
erant.” 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  60-63. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


363 


mercy  and  consideration  into  the  quarrels  of  party  chiefs. 
Flavius  Sabinus  was  some  years  older  than  Yespasian,  the 
head  of  their  house,  and  the  wealthier  of  the  two.  Devoid 
of  personal  ambition,  and  only  anxious  to  spare  effusion  of 
blood,  he  listened  willingly  to  the  instances  of  the  nobles, 
now  gathered  round  him,  urging  him  to  assume  the  lead  of 
his  brother’s  faction,  and  discuss  personally  with  Yitellius 
the  terms  of  accommodation.  In  the  temple  of  Apollo,  with 
one  witness  from  among  the  chiefs  on  either  side,  the  trans- 
fer of  the  empire  was  debated  and  settled.1  But,  unfortu- 
nately, the  city  was  still  filled  with  the  fugitives  from  so 
many  disasters,  desperate  swordsmen  who  could  not  endure 
the  shame  of  yielding.  They  muttered  in  the  ears  of  their 
trembling  chief,  that  there  was  no  hope  of  safety  for  him  in 
a private  station.  The  present  danger,  however,  seemed 
more  terrible  than  the  distant,  and  he  could  not  be  prevailed 
on  to  arm  again.  He  issued  from  the  palace,  clothed  in 
black,  his  family  in  mourning  around  him.2  His  infant  child 
was  borne  in  a litter.  The  procession  might  have  been  taken 
for  a funeral.  The  people  applauded  compassionately,  but 
the  soldiers  frowned  in  silence.  Yitellius  made  a short 
harangue  in  the  forum,  and  then,  taking  his  dagger  from  his 
side,  as  the  ensign  of  power,  tendered  it  to  the  consul  Csecil- 
ius.  The  soldiers  murmured  aloud,  and  the  consul,  in  pity 
or  from  fear,  declined  to  accept  it.  He  then  turned  towards 
the  temple  of  Concord,  meaning  there  to  leave  the  symbols 
of  imperial  office,  and  retire  to  the  house  of  his  brother. 
But  the  soldiers  now  interposed.  They  would  not  suffer  him 
to  hide  himself  in  a private  dwelling,  but  compelled  him  to 
retrace  his  steps  to  the  palace,  which  he  entered  once  more, 
hardly  conscious  whether  he  were  still  emperor  or  not.3 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  65. : “ Saepe  domi  congressi  (in  the  palace  ?)  postremo  in 
aede  Apollinis  pepigere.”  The  temple  of  Apollo  was  probably  that  on  the  Pala- 
tine, connected  with  the  imperial  residence.  Either  it  had  suffered  little  in 
Nero’s  fire,  or  it  had  been  speedily  restored. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  67.,  xv.  Kal.  Jan.  (Dec.  18.  822):  “Audita  defectione  legi- 
onis  cohortiumque,  quae  se  Narniae  dediderant.” 

3 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  68. : “ Interclusum  aliud  iter,  idque  solum  quod  in  Sacram 


364 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


By  the  senate,  however,  by  the  knights,  the  magistrates, 
of  the  city,  the  transfer  of  the  empire  was  re- 
garded as  accomplished.  All  crowded  to  the 
mansion  of  Sabinus,  as  the  representative  of  their 
new  sovereign,  and  there  heard,  not  without  dis- 
may, the  murmurs  and  menaces  of  the  Germanic  cohorts. 
They  urged  Sabinus  to  arm  at  once  for  their  defence,  for  his 
own  defence,  for  the  defence  of  his  brother’s  throne ; but 
their  force  was  small,  their  measures  were  hastily  taken,  and 
while  conveying  him  towards  the  palace,  which  they  wished 
him  at  once  to  occupy,  they  were  met,  at  a spot  called  Fun- 
danius’  pool,  by  the  enraged  Yitellians,  attacked,  and  routed.1 
Sabinus,  with  those  nearest  to  him,  made  for  the  Capitoline  hill, 
and  threw  himself  into  the  enclosed  precincts  of  the  Capitol- 
ium,  or  temple  of  Jupiter.  The  Yitellians  contented  them- 
selves with  watching  the  outlets  during  the  day ; but  at  night 
they  were  too  indolent  or  too  careless  to  keep  guard  through 
a violent  storm  of  rain,  and  Sabinus  was  enabled  to  communi- 
cate with  his  friends  in  the  city,  to  receive  Domitianus  and 
his  own  children  into  his  place  of  refuge,  and  notify  his 
peril  to  the  Flavian  generals  beyond  the  walls.  At  dawn  he 
sent  to  Yitellius  to  complain  of  the  violation  of  their  agree- 
ment, and  remind  him  of  the  good  faith  with  which  he  had 
himself  acted,  and  the  indulgence  with  which,  though  backed 
by  a conquering  army,  he  had  treated  his  opponent.  Yitel- 
lius assented  to  these  representations,  but  pleaded  his  inabil- 

Yiam  pergeret  patebat.”  Yitellius  had  descended  into  the  Yia  Sacra  by  the 
Porta  Hugionis,  traversed  the  forum,  ascended  the  rostra,  and  proceeded  to  the 
temple  of  Concord  at  the  foot  of  the  Capitoline.  He  would  have  retired  to  the 
house  of  Sabinus,  which  I conjecture  (see  the  following  note)  to  have  been  in 
the  direction  of  the  Quirinal ; but  the  soldiers  compelled  him  to  return  by  the 
same  way  he  had  come.  “ Turn  consilii  inops  in  palatium  rediit.” 

1 Of  the  Lacus  Fundani  we  only  learn  from  an  inscription  (Griiter,  396.  5.) 
that  it  gave  name  to  a Yicus.  The  Curtian  and  Servilian  pools  indicated  an- 
cient swamps  in  the  trough  of  the  forum,  which  had  been  drained  by  the  great 
Cloaca.  Possibly  the  Fundanian  Pool  was  a similar  spot  near  the  Suburra.  It 
seems,  from  the  narrative,  that  it  lay  nearly  between  the  house  of  Sabinus  and 
the  Palatine.  The  inscription  is  said  to  have  been  found  on  the  Quirinal 


and  police 

Sabinus  takes 
refuge  in  the 
Capitol. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


365 


ity  to  restrain  his  own  soldiers,  and  could  only  indicate  to 
the  envoy  a secret  way  of  exit  from  the  palace.  Scarcely 
had  this  officer  returned  to  the  Capitol,  when  the  Vitellians 
rushed  tumultuously,  without  a leader,  to  the  assault.  They 
mounted  the  ascent  from  the  forum  to  the  main  entrance  of 
the  enclosure,  and  reached  an  outer  gate  on  the  slope,  as  it 
would  appear,  of  the  Clivus : 1 the  Flavians  issued  on  the 
roofs  of  the  colonnades  which  flanked  the  right  side  of  the 
ascent,  and  hurled  stones  and  tiles  on  the  assail- 

7 . . Attack  and  de- 

ant S.  They  m their  turn,  not  being  furnished  fence  of  the 

with  military  engines,  nor  pausing  to  send  lor 

them,  threw  blazing  brands  into  the  colonnades,  which  were 

probably  of  wood,  and  thus  drove  the  defenders  from  arch 

to  arch,  till  the  fire  reached  the  gate.  The  doors  would  have 

been  soon  consumed,  and  the  Vitellians  would  have  rushed 

into  the  enclosure,  but  Sabinus  had  torn  from  their  pedestals 

the  statues  of  gods  and  men  which  thronged  the  precincts 

of  the  temple,  and  cast  them  down  before  the  gates  to  form 

a barrier.  Thus  baffled,  the  assailants  retreated  down  the 

hill  to  the  forum,  where  two  other  ways  branched  off,  the 

one  immediately  to  the  right,  ascending  to  the  Asylum  be- 

1 Tac.  j Hist.  iii.  71. : “ Cito  agmine  forum  et  imminentia  foro  templa  prae- 
tervecti,  erigunt  aeiem  per  adversum  collem,  usque  ad  primas  Capitolinae  arcis 
fores.”  For  a full  discussion  of  the  topography  of  this  interesting  passage  I 
must  refer  the  reader  to  a notice  in  the  Journal  of  Classical  Philology , No.  x. 
Mar.  1857.  It  may  suffice  to  state  in  this  place  the  conclusions  to  which  I am 
led. — 1.  The  point  of  attack  was  the  Capitoline  temple  or  Capitol,  called  by 
Tacitus  Capitolium  and  Arx  Capitolina.  2.  This  temple  stood  on  the  Tarpeian 
or  S.  W.  summit  of  the  Capitoline  hill,  the  N.  W.  summit  (the  site  of  the  pres- 
ent Araceli)  being  the  Arx  proper,  at  this  time  an  indefensible  position.  3. 
The  outer  gate  (“  primse  fores  ”)  was  perhaps  that  known  by  the  name  of  the 
Porta  Pandana,  on  the  ascent  of  the  Capitoline,  beneath  the  Tabularium.  4. 
The  ascent  by  the  Hundred  Steps  was  from  the  Yelabrum  to  the  left.  5.  That 
by  the  Lucus  Asyli  was  from  the  Forum  and  Career  to  the  right.  6.  The 
second  attack  was  made  from  the  level  of  the  Asylum  (about  the  present  steps 
by  the  Conservators’  palace),  the  assailants  having  turned  the  exterior  defences 
of  the  Capitol  beneath  the  Tabularium.  These  defences,  indeed,  had  been  only 
extemporized,  for  the  Porta  Pandana  was  generally  left  open,  from  whence  it 
took  its  name. 


366 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMAKS 


[A.  D.  69. 


tween  the  Tabularium  and  the  Career ; the  other  in  the  op- 
posite direction,  and  much  more  circuitous,  passing  through 
the  Velabrum  beneath  the  Tarpeian  rock,  and  so  by  the 
flight  of  the  Hundred  Stairs  to  the  platform  of  the  Capitol. 
On  each  side  there  were,  as  it  appears,  lateral  approaches  to 
the  temple ; that  from  the  Asylum  was  the  nearest,  and  here 
the  Vitellians  pressed  with  the  greatest  force  and  numbers. 
The  base  of  the  Capitol  was  about  thirty  feet  higher  than 
that  of  the  Asylum ; but  they  easily  scaled  the  houses,  which 
leant  against  the  wall,  and  rose  to  the  level  of  the  enclosing 
Conflagration  rampart.1 2  The  assailants  forced  their  way  by 
of  the  temple,  ^he  defenders  strove  by  the  same  means  to 

obstruct  their  progress,  nor  was  it  known  from  which  side 
the  flames ' alighted  on  the  roofs  of  the  Capitoline  buildings, 
spread  along  the  galleries  which  surrounded  the  triple  cell, 
and  finally  kindled  the  gable  of  dry  and  ancient  wood  which 
crowned  its  summit.3  The  whole  temple  was  soon  in  a blaze 
from  end  to  end,  and  the  august  sanctuary  of  the  Roman 
people  was  consumed  in  the  raging  conflagration. 

The  assault,  the  defence,  the  conflagration,  were  watched 

1 The  Capitoline  temple  comprehended  three  cells,  those  of  Jupiter,  Juno, 
and  Minerva,  beneath  a single  roof  and  pediment.  It  may  have  been  about 
fifty  feet  in  width,  and  less,  I suppose,  in  height ; built  of  stone,  but  the  roof  of 
wood.  It  was  surrounded  on  three  sides  by  rows  of  pillars,  double  at  the  sides, 
triple  in  front,  but  seems  to  have  been  closed  in  with  a blank  wall  at  the  back. 
This  precinct  was  nearly  a square  of  two  hundred  feet,  erected  upon  a stone 
platform,  which  itself  was  supported  by  vast  obstructions  from  the  base  of  the 
hill.  There  seems  to  have  been  also  an  outer  precinct,  the  Area  Capitolina, 
perhaps  only  in  front,  and  the  whole,  it  may  be  presumed,  was  enclosed  with  a 
wall.  The  Capitol  faced  S.  (Liv.  i.  55.),  more  precisely,  I imagine,  S.  E.,  front- 
ing the  Forum. 

2 Tac.  L c. : “ Inde  lapsus  ignis  in  porticus  appositas  aedibus ; mox  susti- 

nentes  fastigium  aquilae  vetere  ligno  traxerunt  flammam  alueruntque.”  The 
“ aquilae  ” are  the  leaning  rafters  which  formed  the  angle  of  the  pediment,  which 
seem  to  have  been  open,  according  to  the  well-known  description  of  the  temple 
in  the  Iphigenia  in  Tauris  of  Euripides.  We  are  not  to  suppose  that  the  tem- 
ples of  Rome  at  this  period  were  generally  constructed  so  rudely ; but  the  priests 
had  insisted  that  the  Capitol  should  be  rebuilt,  after  the  Sullan  conflagration, 
exactly  on  the  ancient  model 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


367 


by  Yitellius  from  the  palace  opposite  ; by  the  Roman  people 
from  the  fornm  and  Yalabrum  beneath,  as  well  Dmmtianes- 
as  from  the  summit  of  every  hill.  The  Gauls , “^et^and”" 
he  exclaimed,  were  again  masters  of  the  city  / slaui- 
yet  even  the  Gauls  had  never  burnt  the  Capitol , nor  over- 
thrown the  sacred  pledge  of  empire]  the  shrine  of  Jupiter,  the 
Best  and  Greatest , the  shrine  vowed  by  Tarquinius  Prisons, 
and  built  from  the  spoils  of  war  by  Superbus.  Once,  indeed, 
in  the  first  civil  war,  that  holy  fane  had  been  consumed  by 
fire  ; but  it  had  risen  again  from  its  ashes,  erected  by  Sulla, 
and  dedicated  by  Catulus,  whose  honoured  name  had  con- 
tinued to  grace  its  summit  amidst  so  many  monuments  de- 
voted to  the  glory  of  the  Caesars.1  The  fugitives  within  the 
precincts  were  dismayed  with  horror  at  the  scene.  Sabinus 
lost  all  courage  and  presence  of  mind,  and  made  no  further 
attempt  at  defence.  The  Gauls  and  Germans,  checked  by 
no  reverence  for  Roman  divinities,  burst  in  with  yells  of  tri- 
umph, and  put  to  the  sword  all  that  could  not  escape  in  the 
confusion.  Domitian  contrived,  with  a freedman’s  help,  to 
disguise  himself  in  priest’s  robes,  and  found  an  asylum  with 
a servant  of  the  temple.2  Sabinus  was  seized,  bound  and 
carried  to  Yitellius ; the  populace  clamoured  for  his  death, 
as  the  author  of  the  national  calamity ; and  Yitellius  in  vain 
expostulated  with  them  before  the  doors  of  the  palace.  The 
old  man  was  struck  down,  pierced  and  mutilated,  and  his 
headless  trunk  dragged  to  the  Gemoniae.  Atticus,  one  of  the 
consuls,  who  was  taken  with  him,  saved  himself  by  declaring 
that  his  own  hand  had  fired  the  Capitol.  The  Yitellians 
were  satisfied  with  this  avowal,  which  seemed  to  relieve  them 
from  the  crime,  and  the  indignation  of  the  citizens  was 
already  appeased  by  the  blood  of  Sabinus.3 

1 See  above,  chap.  iv.  of  this  work  (Vol.  I.  p.  155,  note).  Notwithstanding 
the  decree  of  the  senate  for  the  substitution  of  Caesar’s  name  for  that  of  Catu- 
lus, the  original  inscription  remained.  Tacitus  says  expressly : “ Lutatii  C'atuli 
nomen  inter  tanta  Caesarum  opera  usque  ad  Yitellium  mansit.” 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  74.:  “Lineo  amictu.”  Comp.  Suet.  Domit.  1.:  “Psiaci 

elatus  habitu.”  3 Tac.  Hist  iii.  75. 


368 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


But  the  blood  of  a brother  of  Vespasian  could  not  sink 
into  the  ground.  No  more  hope  of  pardon  for  the  conquered ; 
Antonins  leads  no  room  for  retreat  and  unmolested  privacy, 
the  gates  of  The  murderer  of  Sabinus  must  now  rush  to  the 

Rome.  field,  or  fall  by  the  hand  of  the  executioner. 

Meanwhile  Lucius  Vitellius  had  not  yet  laid  down  his  arms. 
From  his  camp  at  Feronia  he  continued  to  watch  Tarracina, 
and,  gaining  admittance  there  by  treachery,  slew  the  Flavian 
commander  and  his  undisciplined  partisans.  Had  he  now 
returned  at  once  to  Rome,  he  would  have  met  the  Flavians 
in  the  heart  of  the  city,  and  the  conflict  which  would  have 
ensued  bet  ween  them  might  have  ended  in  its  utter  destruction. 
But  he  contented  himself  with  sending  to  ask  his  brother 
whether  he  should  return,  or  prosecute  the  reduction  of  Campa- 
nia. By  this  delay  the  event  was  decided.  Primus  was  ad- 
vancing along  the  Flaminian  Way,  but  leisurely,  in  order  not 
to  outstrip  the  arrival  of  Mucianus.  At  Oriculum  he  halted 
for  some  days  to  keep  the  feast  of  the  Saturnalia.  However, 
he  sent  forward  Petilius  Cerealis  with  a thousand  horse ; and 
this  squadron  crossing  from  the  Flaminian  to  the  Salarian  Way, 
attempted  to  penetrate  into  the  city.  But  the  Vitellians 
were  on  the  alert,  and  received  them  with  a mixed  force  of 
horse  and  foot  in  the  lanes  and  among  the  garden  walls  out- 
side the  gates,  where  they  checked  and  discomfited  them. 
Primus  had  arrived  at  Saxa  Rubra,  when  he  learnt  the  de- 
struction of  the  Capitol,  the  repulse  of  Cerealis,  and  the 
revived  efforts  of  the  Vitellians,  who  were  arming  the  popu- 
lace and  the  slaves.  Vitellius  himself  had  come  forth  in 
public,  had  harangued  the  citizens,  and  sent  them  forth  to 
defend  their  country : he  had  convened  the  senate  and 
appointed  envoys  to  treat  in  the  name  of  the  republic.  It 
was  not  a time  when  the  voice  of  argument  could  be  heard 
on  either  side,  least  of  all,  the  sage  maxims  and  gentle  ex- 
hortations of  a teacher  of  philosophy,  such  as  the  stoic  Muso- 
nius,  who  mingled  unbidden  with  the  deputation  to  Primus, 
and  harangued  the  soldiers  in  their  ranks  on  the  blessings  of 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


369 


peace  and  the  pains  and  perils  of  warfare.1  From  smiles  and 
jeers  they  would  have  proceeded  to  violence,  had  he  not 
taken  wiser  counsel,  and  abstained  from  his  unseasonable 
admonitions.  The  Vestals,  who  bore  letters  to  the  general, 
were  treated  with  due  respect ; but  their  petition  for  a single 
day  for  conference  was  sternly  rejected.  The  death  of  Sabi- 
nus,  it  was  declared,  and  the  destruction  of  the  Capitol,  had 
rendered  parley  impossible.2 

Indeed  the  soldiers  of  Primus  would  brook  not  an  instant’s 
delay.  They  insisted  on  being  led  immediately  to  the  gates, 
and  panted  for  the  last  death-struggle  with  the  gtorm  of  the 
foes  whose  colours  they  saw  flying  from  the  tatyiiiatheCom* 
summits  of  the  seven  hills.  The  Flavian  army  streets- 
advanced  in  three  divisions ; on  the ‘left  by  the  Salarian  Way 
to  the  Colline  gate ; on  the  right  through  fields  and  meadows 
along  the  bank  of  the  Tiber ; the  centre  occupied  the  Fla- 
minian  road  which  led  direct  to  the  foot  of  the  Capitol.  The 
Vitellians  went  out  to  meet  their  assailants  at  all  points, 
soldiers  and  rabble  mingled  together,  without  plan  or  order. 
But  in  one  quarter  only,  beside  the  gardens  of  Sallust,  on 
the  slope  of  the  Pincian,  where  the  Flavians  were  impeded 
by  narrow  and  slippery  lanes,  did  they  maintain  the  combat 
with  some  spirit,  till  a party  of  the  assailants,  bursting  in 
through  the  Colline  gate,  took  the  defenders  in  the  rear.  At 
the  centre  and  on  the  right  the  Flavians  carried  everything 
immediately  before  them,  and  drove  their  opponents  with 
slaughter  from  the  Campus  Martius  into  the  city.  The 
victors  entered  pell-mell  with  the  vanquished,  for  the  gates 
of  Rome  now  stood,  it  seems,  always  open,  and  the  combat 
was  renewed  from  street  to  street,  the  populace  looking  gaily 
on,  applauding  or  hooting  as  in  the  theatre,  and  helping  to 

1 We  have  last  heard  of  this  philosopher  as  digging  in  the  trench  of  Nero’s 
Isthmian  canal.  It  seems  that  he  had  been  restored,  as  a noble  Roman,  from 
exile,  under  Galba.  Tac.  Hist.  iii.  81.:  “Miscuerat  se  legatis  Musonius  Rufus, 
equestris  ordinis,  studium  philosophise  et  placita  Stoicorum  semulatus  . . 
omisit  intempestivam  sapientiam.” 

2 Tac.  Hist.  '76-81. 

VOL.  vi. — 24 


370 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


drag  the  fugitives  from  the  shops  and  taverns  for  slaughter. 
The  rabble  of  the  city,  men  and  women,  half-drunk,  half- 
naked,  dabbled  in  the  blood  of  the  dead  and  dying,  or  threw 
themselves  into  the  defenceless  houses,  and  snatched  their 
plunder  even  from  the  hands  of  the  soldiers.  Rome  had  seen 
the  conflicts  of  armed  men  in  the  streets  under  Sulla  and 
Cinna,  but  never  before  such  a hideous  mixture  of  levity  and 
ferocity  ; never  before  had  her  bastard  brood,  the  worthless 
mob  of  the  forum,  betrayed  so  flagrantly  their  contempt  for 
the  weal  and  honour  of  their  country.1 2 * * 

Through  all  these  horrors  the  Flavians  forced  their  way 
without  flinching,  and  drove  the  Vitellians  to  their  last 
stronghold  in  the  camp  of  the  praetorians.  The 

Storm  of  the  _.  ..  _ r r _ _ _ 

praetorian  lines  ot  this  enclosure  were  strenuously  attacked 
and  desperately  defended.  The  Vitellians  had 
no  hope  of  escape,  none  of  quarter.  Intent  on  the  capture 
of  Rome,  their  assailants  had  brought  with  them  on  their 
march  the  engines  requisite  for  a siege,  and  now  set  them- 
selves to  their  last  task  with  determination.  They  cleared  the 
battlements  with  the  catapult ; raised  mounds  or  towers  to 
the  level  of  the  ramparts,  or  applied  torches  to  the  gates. 
Then  bursting  into  the  camp,  they  put  every  man  still  sur- 
viving to  the  sword.  Vitellius,  on  the  taking  of  the  city, 
had  escaped  from  the  rear  of  the  palace  in  a litter  to  the 
Aventine,  where  his  wife  possessed  a residence,  hoping  to 
conceal  himself  through  the  day,  and  fly  in  the  darkness  of 
the  night  to  his  brother’s  stronghold  in  Tarracina.  But  his 
restlessness  could  not  suffer  him  to  remain  there. 
He  returned,  under  some  strange  impulse,  once 
more  to  the  palace,  and  roamed  through  its  now 
deserted  halls,  dismayed  at  solitude  and  silence, 
yet  shrinking  from  every  sound,  and  the  presence 


Vitellius,  hesi- 
tating to  make 
his  escape,  is 
dragged  from 
his  conceal- 
ment in  the 
palace  and 
slain. 


of  a human  being.5 


At  last  he  was  found,  half  hidden  be- 


1 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  82,  83.:  “Nulla  partium  cura,  malis  publicis  laeti.”  Dion 
(lxv.  19.)  computes  the  slain  altogether  at  fifty  thousand. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  84. : “ In  palatium  regreditur,  vastum  desertumque 

terret  solitudo  et  tacentes  loci : tentat  clausa ; inhorrescit  vacuis.”  Suet.  Vitell. 

16. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


371 


hind  a curtain,  by  a tribune,  and  ignominiously  dragged  forth. 
With  his  hands  bound,  his  dress  tom,  he  was  hurried  along, 
amidst  the  scoffs  of  the  multitude,  and  without  one  voice 
raised  even  in  pity  for  his  misfortunes.  One  of  the  Germanic 
soldiers  meeting  him,  cut  him  down  at  once,  in  fury,  or 
possibly  in  mercy.  But  with  the  same  blow  the  man  had 
struck  the  tribune,  and  was  immediately  slain  by  his  attend- 
ants. Yitellius  himself  was  not  mortally  wounded,  and  was 
reserved  for  more  pain  and  insult.  The  soldiers  pricked  him 
with  their  weapons,  to  urge  him  on,  or  stopped  him  to  wit- 
ness the  demolition  of  his  statues,  and  gaze  upon  the  spot 
where  Galba  had  fallen : they  kept  his  head  erect  with  a 
sword  placed  beneath  his  chin,  flung  mud  and  filth  in  his 
face,  and  smote  his  cheek  with  insolent  mockery.  At  last 
they  thrust  or  dragged  him  to  the  Gemoniae,  and  there  de- 
spatched him  with  many  wounds.1 

Yet  I was  once  your  Imperator , were  the  last  words  he 
uttered,  and  the  worthiest  that  have  been  recorded  of  him.2 
He  was  once  a Roman  General;  and  to  have  concluding 
commanded  the  legions  was  to  have  felt  the  dig-  eh™rSer°oftlie 
nity  of  a man  responsible  for  the  fate  of  armies  Vitellius- 
and  the  welfare  of  the  provinces.  He  was  once  a Roman 
Emperor;  and  to  have  worn  the  imperial  purple  for  nine 
months  only,  was  to  fill  a space  in  the  world,  and  leave  a 
name  in  history.  It  was  for  this  accident  alone,  indeed,  that 
the  name  of  Yitellius  deserves  to  be  registered  in  human 
annals.  The  frankness  and  good  fellowship  allowed  him 
were  at  best  trifling  and  common-place  merits,  nor  had  he 
the  force  of  character  which  may  render  a bad  man  remark- 

1 Suetonius  is  particular  in  describing  these  insults : “ Religatis  post  terga 
manibus,  injecto  cervicibus  laqueo,  veste  discissa,  seminudus  . . reducto  coma 
capite,  ceu  noxii  solent,  atque  etiam  mento  mucrone  gladii  subrecto,  ut  visen- 
dam  praeberet  faciem  neve  submitteret : quibusdam  stercore  et  coeno  incessen- 
tibus  . . . tandem  apud  Gemonias  minutissimis  ictibus  excarnificatus  est.”  He 
is  repeated  by  Dion,  Eutropius,  and  Orosius. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iii.  85.:  “Vox  nna.  non  degeneris  anrmi  . . . se  tamenlmpera- 
torem  ejus  fuisse.”  Dion,  lxv.  21. 


372 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  69. 


able.  To  bis  indolence,  bis  profligacy,  bis  beastly  sensuality, 
we  have  overwhelming  testimony.  He  was  weak,  easy- 
tempered,  unprincipled,  unscrupulous;  be  was  selfish  and 
hard-hearted ; but  the  charge  of  ferocious  cruelty  made  by 
some  writers  against  him  is  hardly  supported  by  Tacitus,  and 
the  stories  regarding  it  do  not  always  agree  together.  It  is 
recorded  to  his  credit,  that  he  had  spared  not  only  the  kins- 
man of  Vespasian,  who  was  to  succeed  him,  but  of  Otho, 
r whom  he  had  supplanted.1  Some  allowance  may  fairly  be 
made  for  the  countenance  naturally  given  by  his  successor  to 
the  most  disparaging  view  of  his  conduct.  The  account  I 
have  followed  is  circumstantial,  and  consistent,  and  I cannot 
abandon  lines  so  vigorously  traced  by  Tacitus,  for  the  satire 
and  ribaldry  of  Suetonius  and  Dion.  Indeed  the  Histories 
m of  Tacitus,  which  give  the  narrative  of  these 

lies”  of  Taci-  times  in  greater  detail  than  it  seems  necessary 

tus  more  to  be  5;  . . 

relied  on  than  here  to  follow,  are  in  my  ludgment  more  to  be 

his  “Annals”  , _ ’ . / J ® . . 

relied  on  than  his  Annals.  Ihe  pictures  he  has 
drawn  of  Galba,  Otho,  Vitellius  and  Vespasian,  bear  the  full 
impress  of  truth.  They  exhibit  characters  aptly  moulded 
by  the  circumstances  in  which  they  are  placed,  with  such  a 
mixture  of  good  and  evil  as  stamps  them  at  once  as  genuine. 
Relieved  from  the  painful  duty  of  criticizing  and  correcting, 
I have  had  only  to  copy  them  on  a smaller  scale  to  the  best 
of  my  humble  ability. 

The  occupation  of  Rome  by  a conquering  army,  citizens 
in  name,  but  with  none  of  the  feelings  of  citizens  in  their 
hearts,  was  a disaster  long  and  painfully  remem- 

The  Flavian  * 1 J 

leaders  dmde  bered.  The  utter  rout  and  massacre  ot  the  van- 
Eonoon  among  quished  did  not  calm  at  once  the  passions  of  the 
victors.  The  war  was  over,  but  peace  had  not 
recommenced.  Armed  bands  continued  to  traverse  the 
streets,  without  leaders  or  discipline,  insulting  or  attacking 

1 Dion,  lxv.  22.  Tacitus  allows  of  him  (iii.  86.) : “ Inerat  tamen  simplici- 
tas  ac  liberalitas  . . . Amicitias  . . . meruit  magis  quam  habuit.”  Vitellius, 
according  to  the  precise  statement  of  Dion,  lived  fifty-four  years  and  eighty-nine 
days ; bom  in  Sept.  768,  died  Dec.  822. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


373 


all  who  displeased  them,  all  whom  they  chose  to  regard  as 
their  enemies,  many  who  had  no  other  demerit  than  their 
respectable  appearance.  The  thirst  for  blood  was  soon 
turned  to  a lust  of  plunder,  and  now,  under  pretence  of 
searching  for  Vitellians,  or  often  with  no  pretence  at  all,  the 
soldiers  broke  into  private  houses,  guided  by  slaves  and 
clients,  or  even  by  professed  friends  of  the  wealthiest  citi- 
zens. The  chiefs  of  the  Flavian  party  were  unable  to  re- 
strain these  excesses ; they  were  too  intent,  perhaps,  on  se- 
curing the  fruits  of  victory,  to  regard  them.  They  had 
raised  the  young  Domitian  to  the  place  and  name  of  a Cae- 
sar, and  were  now  engaged  in  intriguing  among  themselves 
for  office  under  him.  The  prefecture  of  the  guards  fell  to 
Arrius  Varus;  but  Antonius  Primus  secured  the  substance 
of  power  by  obtaining  superior  influence  over  the  young 
prince’s  mind.  The  slaves  and  valuables  of  the  palace  fell 
to  the  share  of  Primus,  who  claimed  them  almost  avowedly, 
as  the  plunder  due  to  his  victory  at  Cremona.1  One  thing 
alone  remained  to  complete  that  victory,  the  destruction  of 
L.  Vitellius,  and  his  faction  still  in  arms  in  Tarracina.  A 
squadron  of  horse  was  sent  on  as  far  as  Aricia ; the  infantry 
of  a single  legion  halted  at  no  greater  distance  than  Bovillse. 
This  demonstration  was  sufficient.  L.  Vitellius  surrendered 
without  conditions,  and  his  troops  were  led  disarmed  to 
Rome  in  a sort  of  triumphal  procession,  between  the  ranks 
of  their  captors,  scowling  at  the  populace  who  poured  forth 
to  see  them,  and  beheld  their  humiliation  with  flippant  deris- 
ion. Their  chief  was  put  to  death,  but  the  men  were  only 
kept  for  a time  in  custody ; while  the  embers  of  civil  war 
were  easily  stifled  in  Campania,  where  the  Third  legion  was 
quartered  as  in  a conquered  country,  not  so  much  for  the 
sake  of  precaution  as  to  gratify  a mass  of  greedy  and  unruly 
veterans.2 

1 Tins  man  seems  neither  to  have  obtained  nor  claimed  the  character  of  a 
Roman  at  all.  It  had  been  portended  that  Vitellius  should  fall  into  the  hands 
of  a Gaul,  and  Primus  was  born  at  Tolosa,  and  known  in  childhood  by  the  na- 
tive appellation  of  Beccus  (bee),  the  beak  of  a cock.  Suet.  Vitell.  18. 

3 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  1,  2. ; Dion,  1.  c. 


374 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  69. 


The  death  of  Vitellius  on  the  21st  of  December  cleared 
the  field  for  Vespasian;  but  the  prineipate  of  the  new  em- 
The  printipate  peror  dated  from  the  1st  of  July,  the  day  when 
datIsefromX-  t^ie  legi°ns  Swore  to  him  at  Alexandria.  The 
iy  l,  822.  senators  hastened  to  decree  him  all  the  honours 
and  prerogatives  of  empire  in  one  magnificent  manifesto,  and 
paid  zealous  court  to  his  son.1  Vespasian  himself  was  still 
far  distant;  nor,  indeed,  when  the  news  of  his  triumph 
reached  him,  did  he  make  any  precipitate  haste  to  assume  in 
person  the  honours  proffered  him.  His  real  dependence  was 
on  Mucianus,  whom,  true  and  faithful  as  he  knew  him  to  be, 
he  could  suffer  to  assume  the  airs  of  one  who  had  conferred 
an  empire  he  might  have  seized  for  himself.  The  despatches 
this  proud  soldier  sent  to  the  senate,  while  yet  absent  from 
the  city,  caused  anxiety,  and  even  alarm.  The  advice  he 
presumed  to  give  on  public  affairs  might  at  least,  it  was  re- 
marked, have  been  reserved  for  his  place  among  the  sena- 
tors ; but  its  tone,  in  fact,  savoured  of  the  camp,  rather  than 
of  the  Curia.  All,  however,  continued  smooth  externally. 
The  triumphal  ornaments  were  voted  to  him,  ostensibly  for 
the  defence  of  Mcesia.  The  praetorian  insignia  were  conferred 
on  Primus  and  Varus;  and  on  the  same  day  a 

Decree  f(jr  thp.  ** 

restoration  of  decree  was  passed  for  the  restoration  of  the  Cap- 
the  Capitol.  The  language  and  demeanour  of  the  sena- 

tors towards  their  new  chief  and  his  ministers  were  as  fawn- 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  3.:  “At  Romae  Senatus  cuncta  principibus  solita  Vespasi- 
ano  decemit.”  A brazen  tablet  with  an  inscription,  purporting  to  be  a frag- 
ment of  this  very  decree,  is  still  shown  at  Rome  (see  chap.  xxxi.  Vol.  HI.  p. 
381.),  but  its  genuineness  is  disputed.  Orelli  doe9  not  admit  it  into  his  collec- 
tion. The  technical  language  is  no  doubt  occasionally  inaccurate  for  the  time 
of  Vespasian,  but  it  may  be  regarded  as  drawn  up  in  the  phraseology  of  an 
earlier  period.  Of  its  external  marks  of  authenticity,  I have  met  with  no  ac- 
count, except  that  Niebuhr  declares  that  the  mere  inspection  ought  to  satisfy 
an  intelligent  inquirer  in  its  favour.  Rom.  Hist.  i.  343.  note  860.  The  tenor 
of  the  decree  is  to  confer  on  the  new  emperor  all  the  executive  authority  pos- 
sessed by  Augustus,  Tiberius,  and  Claudius,  before  him.  If  it  bestowed  special 
offices  and  titles,  these  must  have  been  enumerated  in  the  earlier  part  of  the 
document,,  which  is  wanting. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


375 


ing  as  under  Nero.  One  of  them  alone,  Hel vidius  Priscus, 
whose  name  became  afterwards  famous,  spoke  Motlon  of  Hel. 
with  no  intemperate  freedom.1  He  proposed  that  vMius 
the  national  temple  should  be  rebuilt  by  the  nation,  and 
Vespasian  be  asked  to  assist  the  good  work  as  the  first  of 
the  citizens,  rather  than  suffer  himself  to  undertake  it  in 
their  name ; a motion  which  the  senate  timidly  passed  over 
in  silence.  The  same  man,  a noted  disciple  of  the  Stoics, 
and  already  conspicuous  for  his  fearlessness,  menaced  the  de- 
lators of  the  late  reigns  with  prosecution.  When,  before  the 
close  of  this  busy  sitting,  a deputation  was  proposed  from 
the  senate  to  Vespasian,  he  insisted  that  the  magistrates 
should  appoint  the  members  of  it  by  open  vote,  choosing  on 
oath  those  whom  they  deemed  most  honourable  and  best  af- 
fected to  the  new  settlement  of  affairs : but  such  a proceed- 
ing, it  was  felt,  would  fix  a stigma  on  the  bad  or  suspected, 
and,  after  a sharp  debate,  the  courtiers  of  the  late  emperors 
carried  the  appointment  by  ballot.2 

The  efforts  of  the  sterner  patriots  to  bring  the  culprits  of 
the  late  reigns  to  justice,  as  the  only  way  in  which  they 
could  proclaim  their  own  principles,  caused  much 

. . . , i n i it  -i  , Strong  meas- 

agitation  m the  ranks  oi  the  nobles,  and,  coupled  nres  of  Mucia- 
with  the  suppressed  irritation  of  the  conquered  nus  m the  Clt7‘ 
and  the  licentious  violence  of  the  conquerors,  threatened  a 
fresh  crisis  in  the  city.  The  speedy  entry  of  Mucianus  within 
the  walls  was  felt  as  a relief,  and  there  was  a general  dispo- 
sition to  appeal  to  his  decision,  and  sanction  all  his  measures. 
He  began  by  imposing  restraint  on  Primus  and  Varus,  and 
making  them  feel  that  they  had  found  a master.  All  eyes 
were  immediately  turned  towards  him ; courtiers  and  sena- 
tors thronged  anxiously  around  him.  He  paraded  the  streets 
at  the  head  of  his  armed  bands,  checked  licence  with  a 
strong  hand,  and  disposed  at  his  will  of  the  houses  and  gar- 
dens which  had  become  for  a moment  the  prey  of  the  most 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  5,  6. 

2 Tac.  1.  c. : “Eo  Senatus  die  quo  de  imperio  Vespasiani  censebant.”  The 
whole  of  these  proceedings  were  the  work  of  a single  day. 


376 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  70. 


audacious  plunderer.  Leaving  still  to  Vespasian  the  title  of 
emperor,  he  seized  on  all  the  power,  and  treated  even  the 
son  of  Vespasian  as  his  subaltern.  With  cruel  precaution, 
he  commanded  the  death  of  Galerianus,  the  son  of  the  unfor- 
tunate Piso,  Galba’s  colleague  for  a week,  as  a possible  pre- 
tender to  the  empire ; and  he  was  gratified  with  the  suicide 
of  Priscus,  the  Vitellian  prefect  of  the  praetorians,  who  killed 
himself  from  shame  and  mortification.  Asiaticus,  the  freed- 
man  and  favourite  of  the  late  emperor,  was  degraded  to  a 
slave’s  death  on  the  cross.1 

On  the  1st  of  January,  823,  ten  days  after  the  death  of 
Vitellius,  affairs  in  the  city  seemed  to  resume  their  usual 
course  with  the  appointment  of  Vespasian  and  Titus  to  the 
consulship ; though  the  occurrence  of  stormy  weather,  which 
kept  the  corn-fleets  of  Africa  out  at  sea,  alarmed  the  people, 
and  caused  rumours  of  a revolt  in  that  important  province. 
Domitian  was  raised  to  the  prsetorship,  and  he  filled  ostensi- 
bly the  first  place  in  the  administration ; but  he  was  indolent 
and  dissolute,  and  abandoned  himself  to  intrigue  and  de- 
bauchery. While  this  young  prince’s  name  was  affixed  to 
every  edict  and  appointment,  the  real  power  in  all  essential 
matters  remained  in  the  hands  of  Mucianus.  The  interests 
of  Vespasian  were  secured  by  a general  change  in  the  mag- 
istracy, both  at  home  and  in  the  provinces,  and  the  emperor 
is  said  to  have  thanked  Domitian  ironically  for  not  supersed- 
ing him  in  his  eastern  command.2  Mucianus  was  not  less 
intent  on  breaking  down  the  influence  of  Primus  and  Varus : 
he  withdrew  their  best  legions  from  their  command,  and 
these  he  dismissed  to  the  Syrian  or  German  frontier.  His 
utmost  vigilance  was  still  required  to  allay  the  animosities 
which  were  repeatedly  breaking  out  among  the  soldiers  of 
so  many  generals  in  the  city,  and  not  less  to  satisfy  the  de- 
mand excited  by  their  reckless  promises.  A praetorian  guard 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  11.  For  the  splendid  fortunes  of  Asiaticus,  see  Tac.  Hist.  ii. 
95. : “ Nondum  quartus  a victoria  mensis,  et  libertus  Vitellii  Asiaticus,  Polycle- 
tos,  Patrobios,  et  vetera  odiorum  nomina  sequabat.”  For  his  infamous  com- 
pliances, such  as  popular  rumour  described  them,  Suet.  Vitell.  12. 

2 Dion,  lxvi.  2. 


A.  U.  823.] 


TINDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


377 


was  embodied  from  among  the  most  clamorous  of  every 
army,  and  many  who  coveted  the  pay  and  indulgences  of 
their  favoured  service  were  with  difficulty  appeased  with 
honours  and  donatives.  The  necessities  of  the  government 
demanded  an  aid  of  sixty  millions  of  sesterces,  which  it  was 
proposed  to  exact  by  a forced  loan  from  the  citizens ; but  the 
decree  for  raising  it  was  not  put  in  execution.  It  was  used 
perhaps  only  as  a menace,  the  dread  of  which  stimulated  the 
people  to  rally  round  the  government.  As  Mucianus  grew 
stronger,  his  acts  became  more  and  more  vigorous.  The 
consulships  promised  by  L.  Vitellius  were  formally  with- 
drawn from  his  nominees  and  given  to  trusty  friends  of  the 
victor,  and  the  remains  of  the  martyred  Sabinus  were  hon- 
oured with  a public  funeral.  The  murder  of  L.  Piso,  a cousin 
of  Galerianus,  might  seem  to  confirm  the  power  of  the  new 
dynasty  by  removing  another  collateral  pretender;  but  it 
affected  it  with  a deep  stain.  This  indeed  was  not  the  act 
of  Vespasian,  nor  even  of  Mucianus,  but  of  Piso’s  colleague 
in  the  government  of  Africa,  who  tried  first  to  engage  him 
in  a revolt,  and,  when  baffled  by  his  unambitious  modesty, 
accused  him  falsely  of  the  attempt,  and  raised  an  armed 
force  to  despatch  him.1 * 

Many  a herald  of  victory,  eager  for  reward,  had  crossed 
the  seas  during  the  winter,  to  be  the  first  to  greet  Vespasian 
with  the  tidings  of  his  success.  They  had  found  him  in  his 
quarters  at  Alexandria,  arranging,  on  the  one  hand,  the  plan 
of  his  son’s  operations  in  Judea,  preparing,  on  the  other,  for 
his  own  descent  upon  Italy,  as  soon  as  the  season  should  ad- 
mit of  embarking  his  troops.  While  his  fortunes  were  yet 
dubious,  such  had  been  the  anticipation  of  his  success,  that 
Vologesus  offered  him  forty  thousand  horsemen  for  the  cam- 
paign ; and  it  was  considered  the  height  of  good  fortune  in 
a Roman  general  to  have  received  such  an  offer  from  the  na- 
tional enemy,  and  to  be  in  a condition  to  refuse  it.3  The 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iy.  39.  47.  50. 

3 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  51. ; Suet.  Vesp.  6.  But  a few  years  before,  Lucan  had  ex- 


378 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  70. 


Parthian  monarch  was  desired  to  tender  his  alliance  to  the 
senate,  and  informed  that  peace  was  already  restored  to 
Rome  by  the  hands  of  the  Romans  themselves.  But,  amidst 
his  triumphs,  Yespasian  heard  with  vexation  of  the  vices  of 
Domitian,  which  were  throwing  a shade  over  the  opening 
promise  of  his  principate.  He  seems  to  have  been  early  ap- 
prised that  the  young  man  was  aiming,  vaguely  and  frivo- 
lously indeed,  on  seizing  the  empire  for  himself ; and  though 
it  was  clear  that  he  had  neither  abilities  nor  influence  for 
such  an  enterprise,  that  he' should  merely  harbour  the  thought 
was  distressing  alike  to  the  prince  and  to  the  father.  Titus, 
to  whom  he  now  finally  committed  the  conduct  of  the  Jew- 
ish war,  interceded,  before  leaving  him,  for  his  erring  brother, 
venturing  to  remind  him  that  friends  might  be  changed  with 
circumstances,  but  that  kinsmen  must  always  remain  such, 
and  to  warn  him  that  the  brothers  would  not  long  continue 
united,  if  their  sire  set  them  the  example  of  disregarding  the 
ties  of  blood.  Yespasian  promised  to  watch  over  the  com- 
mon interests  of  his  house,  and  dismissed  him  to  the  great 
struggle  which  was  to  make  him  illustrious  among  Roman 
generals.  He  urged  forward  the  despatch  of  corn-vessels 
from  Egypt ; for  Rome  was  suffering  from  scarcity.  When 
the  ships  arrived  with  their  freight,  only  ten  days’  consump- 
tion of  grain  remained,  it  was  said,  in  the  city.1 

With  the  return  of  abundance  and  tranquillity,  the  first 
care  of  the  senate  was  to  commence  the  restoration  of  the 
Capitol;  for  while  the  temple  of  Jupiter  lay  in 

Foundation  of  p . ’ . . L.  r _ *Y 

the  new  Capi-  rums  the  fortunes  ot  the  empire  seemed  to  suiter 
an  eclipse.  This  pious  work  was  entrusted,  ac- 
cording to  ancient  precedent,  to  one  of  the  most  respected 
of  the  citizens,  by  name  L.  Yestinus,  who,  though  only  of 
knightly  family,  was  equal  in  personal  repute  to  any  of  the 
senators.3  The  Haruspices,  whom  he  consulted,  demanded 

pressed  tlie  deepest  disgust  at  the  intention  imputed  to  Pofnpeius  of  seeking  aid 
from  Parthia.  “ Quid  Parthos  transire  doces  ? ” Phars.  viii.  331.  foil. 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  52. 

2 Tac.  Hist  iv.  53. : “Equestris  ordinis  virum,  sed  auctoritate  famaque  inter 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


379 


that  the  ruins  of  the  fallen  building  should  be  conveyed  away, 
and  cast  into  the  lowest  places  of  the  city,  and  the  new  tem- 
ple erected  precisely  on  the  old  foundations ; for  the  gods, 
they  declared,  would  have  no  change  made  in  the  form  of 
their  familiar  dwelling.  On  the  20th  June,  being  a fair  and 
cloudless  day,  the  area  of  the  temple  precincts  was  surround- 
ed with  a string  of  fillets  and  chaplets.  Soldiers,  chosen  for 
their  auspicious  names,  were  marched  into  it,  bearing  boughs 
of  the  most  auspicious  trees  ; and  the  Vestals,  attended  by  a 
troop  of  boys  and  girls,  both  whose  parents  were  living, 
sprinkled  it  with  water  drawn  from  bubbling  founts  or  run- 
ning streamlets.  Then,  preceded  by  the  pontiffs,  the  praetor 
Helvidius,  stalking  round,  sanctified  the  space  with  the  mys- 
tical washing  of  sow’s,  sheep’s,  and  bull’s  blood,  and  placed 
their  entrails  on  a grassy  altar.  This  done,  he  invoked  Jove, 
Juno,  and  Minerva,  and  all  the  patrons  of  the  empire,  to  pros- 
per the  undertaking,  and  raise  by  divine  assistance  their  tem- 
ple, founded  by  the  piety  of  men.  Then  he  touched  with 
his  hand  the  connected  fillets,  and  the  magistrates,  the  priests, 
the  senators,  the  knights,  with  a number  of  the  people,  lent 
their  strength  to  draw  a great  stone  to  the  spot  where  the 
building  was  to  commence.2  Beneath  it  they  laid  pieces  of 
gold  and  silver  money,  minted  for  the  occasion,  as  well  as  of 
unwrought  metal ; for  the  Haruspices  forbade  either  stone 
or  metal  to  be  used  which  had  been  employed  before  for  pro- 
fane purposes.  The  temple  rose  from  the  deep  substructions 
of  Tarquinius  exactly,  as  was  required,  on  the  plan  of  its  pre- 
decessor. Formerly,  when  this  fane  was  restored  under  Ca- 
tulus,  it  was  wished  to  give  greater  effect  to  the  cell  by 
placing  it  on  a flight  of  steps ; and  it  was  proposed,  not  to 

proceres.”  Of  the  man  who  obtained  this  unusual  honour,  strangely  enough 
nothing  whatever  is  known.  An  Atticus  Vestinus  is  mentioned  as  consul  in 
818,  and  suffering  under  Nero,  Ann.  xv.  69.,  but  the  gens  is  not  known  of  either, 
nor  whether  there  was  any  connexion  between  them.  Comp.  Martial,  iv.  72. 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  63.  The  ruins  of  the  old  building  were  removed  to  the 
foundations,  and  carted  into  the  low  grounds  at  the  foot  of  the  hill.  “ Harus- 
pices monuere  ut  reliquiee  prioris  delubri  in  paludes  aveherentur.” 


380 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  70. 


heighten  the  building  itself,  which  the  Haraspices  forbade, 
bnt  to  lower  the  platform  before  it.  But  this  platform  was 
itself*  the  roof  of  a labyrinth  of  vaults  and  galleries,  used 
for  offices  and  storerooms,  and  this  expedient  was  pronounced 
impracticable.  Vespasian,  more  fortunate  than  his  predeces- 
sor, obtained  permission  to  raise  the  elevation  of  the  edifice, 
which  now,  perhaps  for  the  first  time,  was  allowed  to  over- 
top the  colonnades  around  it,  and  to  fling  its  broad  bulk 
athwart  the  templum  of  the  southern  sky,  in  which  the  aus- 
pices were  taken  from  the  neighbouring  summit  of  the 
Arx.1 

In  the  eyes  of  the  citizens  one  thing  alone  might  seem 
wanting  on  this  occasion  to  their  prince’s  glory,  that  he 
should  himself  be  present  at  the  solemnity,  and  conduct  it  in 
person.  So  natural  was  it,  indeed,  to  suppose  him  there, 
taking  the  part  of  an  Augustus  or  a Claudius  in  the  expiation 
of  his  country’s  sins,  that  it  came  to  be  commonly  believed 
that  he  was  actually  present,  and  such  is  the  assertion  of 
some  writers  of  authority.2  Yet  the  circumstantial  account 
of  Tacitus  proves  clearly  that  this  was  not  the  case,  and  the 
discrepancy  is  worth  noting  from  the  hint  it  gives  us  of  the 
causes  which  have  helped  to  obscure  the  truth  of  facts  at 
The  Flavian  this  period.  Vespasian  was  already  assuming  in 
tobe^ the  eyes  of  the  Romans  something  of  the  divine 
stitiou5  rever-  character : the  Flavian  race  was  beginning  to 
ence-  supplant  the  Julian  in  their  imagination ; or 

rather  what  was  wanting  to  the  imagination  was  supplied 
by  the  spirit  of  flattery,  which  represented  the  hero  himself 


1 Tac.  1.  c. : “ Altitudo  se  dibus  adjecta : id  solum  religio  adnuere : et  prioris 
templi  magnificentiae  defuisse  ereditum.”  For  the  story  about  Catulus  see  Gel- 
lius,  ii.  10.  The  templum,  in  the  augural  sense,  was  the  southern  half  of  the 
heavens,  as  observed  from  the  Auguraculum,  a spot  on  the  northern  summit  of 
the  hill.  This  summit  is  thirty  feet  higher  than  the  Tarpeian,  and  may  possibly 
have  commanded  a clear  view,  as  was  technically  required,  over  the  roof  of  the 
Capitoline  temple.  It  seems  not  improbable  that  the  difficulty  about  elevat- 
ing the  temple  arose  from  the  objection  to  its  cutting  the  horizon,  which  it  re- 
quired the  good  fortune  of  a Vespasian  to  overcome. 

2 Suet.  Vesp.  8. ; Dion,  lxvi.  10. 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


381 


and  all  that  concerned  him  in  factitious  colours.1  It  began 
to  be  affirmed  that  the  marvellous  rise  of  the  Sabine  veteran 
had  been  signified  long  before  by  no  doubtful  omens  at  home ; 
a Jewish  captive,  the  historian  Josephus,  had  prophetically 
saluted  him  as  emperor ; 2 the  common  and  constant  belief  of 
the  Jews,  that  from  the  midst  of  them  should  spring  a ruler 
of  the  world,  was  declared  to  have  received  in  this  event  its 
glorious  consummation.  But  while  the  Romans  were  thus 
surrounding  the  object  of  their  reverence  with  the  halo  of 
sanctity,  the  Orientals  had  ventured  to  invest  him  with  at- 
tributes more  palpably  divine.  At  Alexandria  a blind  man, 
one  well  known  as  such,  so  it  is  pretended,  in  the  city,  had 
thrown  himself  at  his  feet  and  implored  him  to  Miraculous 
touch  his  eyes  with  spittle ; a cripple  had  entreat-  £™sapasi£nd 
ed  him  to  plant  his  heel  upon  him.  Both  declar-  at  Alexan<Ma- 
ed  that  their  god  Serapis  had  assured  them  of  the  new  demi- 
god’s power  to  heal  their  infirmities.  Vespasian,  as  a blunt 
soldier,  was  inclined  to  laugh  at  these  importunities,  but  his 
flatterers  urged  him  to  make  trial  of  his  growing  divinity, 
and  his  physicians  at  the  same  time  encouraged  him  to  be- 
lieve that  the  suppliants  were  only  partially  blind  or  lame, 
and  possibly  his  operation  in  the  way  prescribed  might  have 
some  natural  efficacy.  At  all  events,  they  added,  he  might 
gain  in  reputation  by  success,  while  he  could  not  lose  by 
failure.  V espasian,  half  cynical,  half  superstitious,  put  forth 
his  hand  and  his  foot,  and  when  the  blind  saw  and  the  lame 
walked,  allowed  himself  easily  to  be  deceived  by  one  of  the 
grossest  impostures  recorded  in  sober  history.  He  conceived 
an  immense  admiration  for  the  god  who  had  so  justly  meas- 
ured his  extraordinary  powers,  and  when  he  went  to  consult 

1 Suet.  Vesp.  7. : “ Auctoritas  et  quasi  majestas  qusedam  inopinato  et  adhue 
novo  principi  deerat : hgec  quoque  accessit.”  Sil.  Ital.  iii.  594. : 

“Exin  se  Curibus  virtus  coelestis  ab  astra 
Efferet,  et  sacris-  augebit  nomen  Iulis 
Bellatrix  gens  baccifero  nutrita  Sabino.” 

2 Suet.  Vespas.  5.  Joseph.  B.  J.  iii.  8,  9.  Comp.  Tac.  Hist.  ii.  78. : “Re* 
cursabant  animo  vetera  omina ; ” foil. 


382 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  70. 


him  in  his  temple  at  Alexandria,  the  priests  took  care  to  con- 
firm this  devotion  by  fresh  omens  of  impending  greatness.1 

Vespasian,  however,  had  not  loitered  on  his  way  to 
empire  in  quest  of  oracles  to  assure  him  of  it.  He  had  been 
Vespasian  detained  through  the  spring  of  823  by  north-west 
breaches’  winds,  which  prevented  navigation  at  that  season, 
Smmerof6  and  it  was  not  till  the  end  of  May  that  he  was 
82a  able  to  put  to  sea  and  direct  his  course  towards 

Italy.2  Had  he  sailed  direct  to  Rome  he  might  yet  have 
reached  his  destination  in  time  to  share  in  the  ceremony  on 
the  Capitoline ; hut  reasons  of  state  which  have  not  been 
explained  to  us  may  have  determined  him  to  advance  more 
leisurely,  and  to  visit  the  various  spots  in  Asia  and  Greece 
at  which  vessels  usually  touched  on  their  way  westward.3 
It  seems  clear  that  he  was  not  anxious  to  get  quickly  to 
Rome.  Possibly  he  wished  his  affairs  to  be  well  established 
by  Mucianus  before  his  own  arrival,  and  the  odium  which 
might  attach  to  the  first  necessary  severities  to  be  partly 
dissipated.  Among  these  was  the  execution  of  the  son  of 
Vitellius,  whom  Mucianus  had  sacrificed  to  the  interests  of 
the  new  dynasty.  The  same  minister  had  set  himself  sternly 
against  the  claims  of  Antonius  Primus  to  the  emperor’s 
special  confidence.  He  would  not  suffer  Domitian  to  retain 
him  among  his  companions,  and  had  driven  him  to  leave 
Italy,  and  represent  to  Vespasian  in  person  his  merits  and 
their  requital.  But  the  letters  of  Mucianus  effectually  counter- 
acted the  influence  he  might  hope  to  exercise  by  personal 
application.  The  emperor  regarded  him  with  jealousy,  and 
was  fully  persuaded,  on  the  testimony  of  many  friends,  that 
his  arrogance  was  unpopular  among  the  citizens,  as  well  as 
dangerous  to  the  stability  of  the  government.4  If  he  con- 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  81,  82.  Suet.  Vespas.  7.  Dion,  lxvi.  8. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  81  : “ iEstivis  flatibus  certa  maria  incipiunt  vi.  kal.  Jun. 
(die  xxvii.  Mai)  et  desinunt  viii.  kal.  Oct.  (die  xiv.  Sept.),”  Brotier.  in  loc. 

3 Joseph.  B.  J.  vii.  2.  1. : eig  'P 66ov  dceficuve  • kvrevdev  . . . tt aaag  rag  kvr<J 
irapanfaj  Tr6?i£ig  erreTiduv. 

4 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  80. 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


383 


tinned,  however,  to  treat  Primus  with  outward  respect,  it 
was  perhaps  from  the  apprehensions  he  could  not  wholly 
discard  of  his  own  minister.  While  the  affairs  of  the  new 
dynasty  at  Rome  seemed  to  be  settled  firmly,  and  the  capital 
itself  lay  prostrate  from  its  exertions  and  sufferings  during 
two  years  of  agitation,  such  as  it  had  not  experienced  since 
the  days  of  Marius  and  Sulla,  its  position  in  the  provinces 
was  by  no  means  equally  secure.  The  services  of  Mucianus 
were  again  put  in  requisition  to  stay  the  defection  of  a great 
army  in  Gaul  • but  his  authority,  which  threatened  to  become 
too  great  for  a subject,  was  soon  happily  balanced  by  the 
exploits  of  the  heir  to  the  empire  in  Judea. 


384 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


CHAPTER  LYIII. 

REVOLTS  IN  THE  PROVINCES:  THE  NORTH-WEST. — CLAUDIUS  CIVILIS,  UNDER  PRE- 
TENCE OF  SIDING  WITH  VESPASIAN,  INTRIGUES  FOR  THE  SUBVERSION  OF  THE 
ROMAN  POWER  ON  THE  RHINE. — CRITICAL  STATE  OF  THE  LEGIONS,  THE  AUX- 
ILIARIES, AND  THE  PROVINCE. — DISASTERS  TO  THE  ROMAN  ARMS.— CIVILIS 
BESIEGES  THE  ROMAN  STATION  OF  VETERA. — MUTINY  AMONG  THE  LEGIONARIES. 
— SLAUGHTER  OF  THEIR  GENERAL  AND  DISSOLUTION  OF  THEIR  FORCES. — TRI- 
UMPHANT EXPECTATIONS  OF  A GALLO-GERMAN  EMPIRE. — CAPITULATION  AND 
MASSACRE  OF  THE  GARRISON  OF  VETERA. — MOVEMENT  OF  THE  FLAVIAN  CHIEFS 
FOR  THE  RECOVERY  OF  THE  PROVINCE. — CAMPAIGN  OF  CERIALIS,  AND  DEFEAT 
OF  CIVILIS. — GRADUAL  SUPPRESSION  OF  THE  REVOLT  AND  SUBMISSION  OF 
CIVILIS. — STORY  OF  JULIUS  SABINUS,  AND  FINAL  PACIFICATION  OF  GAUL. 

(a.  d.  69,  10.  a.  u.  822,  823.) 

THE  Romans,  it  will  be  remembered,  did  not  turn  their 
arms  against  one  another  in  the  greatest  of  their  civil 
wars,  till  Caesar  had  reduced  the  West  and  Pom- 

Fonnidable  re-  . . ,..  -re- 

volts in  the  perns  the  East  to  entire  submission.  JDurmg  the 

twenty  years  of  the  struggle  between  the  senate 
and  the  people  the  provinces  lay  in  perfect  repose.  While 
the  blood  of  their  conquerors  was  flowing  in  torrents,  while 
their  garrisons  were  withdrawn  from  the  frontiers  to  the 
heart  of  the  empire,  while  the  commonwealth  itself  lay 
prostrate  with  exhaustion,  the  conquered  made  no  effort  to 
regain  their  independence;  even  the  nations  beyond  the 
border  looked  on  in  silent  amazement.  Far  different  was  the 
condition  of  the  Roman  states  when  the  fears,  the  indig- 
nation, or  the  selfish  ambition  of  Galba,  and  Galba’s  rivals 
and  successors,  once  more  marshalled  the  legions  in  mutual 
conflict.  At  either  extremity  of  their  wide  dominions,  in  the 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


385 


north-west  and  south-east,  there  arose  at  this  period  formida- 
ble revolts  against  the  rulers  of  the  nations  ; nor  were  they 
repressed  without  the  employment  of  great  military  resources 
and  the  effusion  of  much  Roman  blood.  The  wars  I have 
now  to  relate  are  interesting — one  of  them  most  deeply  so — 
in  their  character  and  results,  and  it  will  be  important  to 
observe  the  pertinacity  with  which  the  conquerors  still 
maintained  their  attitude  in  the  face  of  their  foreign  subjects, 
at  a moment  when  all  their  energies  seemed  tasked  to  keep 
erect  the  frame  of  their  government  at  home. 

The  country  of  the  Batavi,  the  island  between  the  chan- 
nels of  the  Wahal  and  the  Old  Rhine,  scarce  rose  above  the 
surrounding  waters  ; the  beds  of  its  broad  rivers  civiiis,  the 
had  not  been  raised  by  the  Alpine  debris  which  Batav?, Resents 
have  strewn  them  for  eighteen  ages  since ; but  treatment^ 
neither  had  its  plains  been  protected  from  sea  the  Romans, 
and  land  floods  by  lines  of  artificial  embankment.  A natural 
delta,  like  that  of  the  Nile  or  Ganges  at  the  present  day, 
intersected  with  innumerable  channels,  streaked  with  lakes 
and  stagnant  pools,  covered  with  rank  grasses  and  tangled 
brushwood,  formed  the  strip  of  neutral  land  which  the  Ro- 
mans allowed  to  intervene  between  their  province  and  the 
lair  of  yet  untrodden  barbarism.  This  wilderness  was  per- 
haps too  difficult  to  conquer,  too  inhospitable  to  colonize ; 
but,  on  the  other  hand,  the  wants  of  its  inhabitants,  who 
depended  for  everything  but  meat  and  fish  upon  their  more 
civilized  neighbours,  rendered  them  amenable  in  some  degree 
to  Roman  influence ; nor  did  they  refuse  to  acknowledge 
their  dependence  by  serving  the  Roman  government  with 
their  arms  and  paying  it  a nominal  tribute.  The  Batavi,  an 
offshoot  of  the  great  nation  of  the  Chatti,  were  a tribe  of 
horsemen,  and  their  gallantry  in  the  field  and  skill  in  riding 
and  swimming  on  horseback  made  them  useful  auxiliaries  in 
the  German  campaigns.  One  of  the  most  conspicuous  of 
their  chiefs  at  this  period  was  Claudius  Civiiis,  whose  name 
seems  to  indicate  that  he  had  attached  himself  as  a client  to 
the  imperial  family,  and  perhaps  attained  the  distinction  of 
vol.  vi. — 25 


386 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


Roman  citizenship.1 2 * * * * *  This  man  now  commanded  a cohort  of 
his  native  cavalry  in  the  service  of  Rome ; "but  a brother 
named  Julius  Paulus  had  been  beheaded  for  some  act  of  in- 
subordination, and  Civilis  himself  transported  to  Italy,  and 
cast  into  a dungeon  there,  in  the  latter  days  of  Nero.  Galba, 
however,  had  released  and  sent  him  home,  where  the  legions, 
indignant  at  such  favour  accorded  to  a rebel,  again  demanded 
his  punishment,  and  he  was  only  saved  by  the  policy  of 
Vitellius,  afraid,  it  would  seem,  of  irritating  a restless  ally 
in  the  rear  of  his  base  of  operations.  But  the  Batavian  was 
already  beyond  the  power  of  soothing  : he  saw  the  Romans 
intent  only  on  mutual  slaughter ; he  beheld  the  garrisons  of 
the  Rhenish  frontier  moving,  by  troops  and  battalions,  south- 
ward ; he  felt  from  his  own  haughty  indignation  that  the 
name  of  Rome  was  odious  to  Gauls  and  Germans  alike ; and 
he  burned  to  employ  the  skill  and  conduct  learnt  in  the 
camps  of  the  conquerors,  for  the  subversion  of  their  power, 
and  the  revenge  of  public  and  private  wrongs. 

The  moment  for  this  revolt  was  sagaciously  chosen.  The 
strength  of  the  Germanic  legions  had  been  drained  off  into 
Reduced  Italy,  and  though  we  shall  still  meet  with  the 
ggaf  Di?e  names  of  the  First,  the  Fifth,  the  Fifteenth,  and 
tteBei^cn°f  the  Sixteenth  in  the  Lower,  and  of  the  Fourth, 
trihes.  the  Thirteenth,  and  the  Eighteenth  in  the  Upper 

Province,  we  must  regard  these  as  mere  skeleton  battalions, 
denuded  of  their  best  men  and  most  experienced  officers.8 

1 Civilis  is  called  Julius,  Tac.  Hist.  i.  59.,  but  Claudius,  iv.  13.  I have 
adopted  the  name  most  commonly  given  to  him  by  modem  writers.  The  Clau- 
dian  emperors  were  themselves  sometimes  designated  as  Julii,  from  the  house 
into  which  they  were  adopted. 

2 Comp.  Tac.  Hist.  i.  55.  59.,  iv.  24.  The  history  of  the  disposition  of  the 

Roman  legions,  during  the  three  centuries  that  we  have  traces  of  it,  is  one  of 

the  most  intricate  problems  of  antiquity.  Marquardt  (in  Becker’s  Handbuch , 

iii.  2.  352.)  has  treated  the  subject  elaborately : he  refers,  however,  sometimes 

to  critics  whom  I have  not  been  able  to  consult,  and  I do  not  always  compre- 

hend his  processes.  The  reader  must  remember  that  the  skeleton  or  depot  of 

a legion,  the  strength  of  which  was  drafted  off  to  a distance,  might  still  retain 
its  name  in  its  original  quarters.  Sometimes  in  such  cases  the  legion  was  split 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


387 


Moreover,  Galba  had  been  obliged  to  buy  the  support  of  the 
Roman  residents  in  Gaul  by  the  establishment  of  a new 
colony,  Augusta  of  the  Treviri  on  the  Moselle,  at  the  expense 
of  the  native  landowners  ; and  not  among  the  Treviri  only, 
but  throughout  the  Belgic  tribes,  deep  dissatisfaction  had 
been  created  by  the  exactions  with  which  he  had  pampered 
his  ill-disciplined  armies  and  replenished  his  empty  treasu- 
ries.1 The  spirit,  indeed,  of  the  unarmed  provincials  was 
too  thoroughly  cowed  by  the  terror  of  the  Roman  name,  or 
their  strength  too  much  broken  by  the  constant  drafts  made 
on  their  youth  for  distant  service,  to  allow  them  to  rush  into 
the  field  against  their  masters ; but  we  may  believe  that 
they  were  prompt  in  aiding  their  revolted  compatriots  with 
supplies  and  secret  information. 

The  man  who  flung  this  bold  defiance  at  the  conquerors, 
ventured,  it  was  said,  to  compare  himself  with  Hannibal  and 
Sertorius,  who  both  like  him  aspired  to  overthrow  Ciyilis  spreads 
the  Romans  by  the  arms  of  their  own  subjects, 
and  both  like  him  were  rendered  terrible  to  the  Gaulish  states* 
beholders  by  the  loss  of  an  eye.2  Hannibal  crossed  the  Alps 
to  bring  succour  to  the  Gauls  and  Samnites ; Sertorius  brought 
the  guerillas  of  Spain  to  support  the  cause  of  the  Marians  at 
Rome.  Civilis,  at  the  instance  of  Antonius  Primus,  pre- 
tended to  raise  Vespasian’s  standard  against  the  forces  of 
Vitellius  on  the  Rhine,  but  among  the  trustiest  of  his  own 

into  two,  and  the  supplemental  division  received  a distinguishing  title,  such  as 
Gemina.  According  to  the  arrangement  of  Augustus,  there  should  have  been 
four  legions  in  the  Upper  and  the  same  number  in  the  Lower  Germania ; thus 
we  find  in  the  year  767  legions  ii.,  xiii.,  xiv.,  xvi.  in  the  one,  and  i.,  v.,  xx.,  xxi. 
in  the  other.  (Tac.  Ann.  i.  37.)  Of  these,  ii.  and  xiv.  had  been  transferred  to 
Britain,  and  replaced  by  iv.  and  xv.  The  xx.  and  xxi.  have  disappeared,  and 
instead  of  them  we  find  the  xviii.  only. 

1 The  date  of  the  Roman  colony  at  Augusta  Trevirorum  can  only  be  fixed 
approximately.  Steininger  ( Gesch . der  Trevirer , p.  83.)  ascribes  the  founda- 
tion, with  great  probability,  to  Galba,  referring  to  the  statement  of  Tacitus,  Hist 
i.  53.  Comp.  Suet.  Galb.  12. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  13. : “ Sertorium  se  aut  Hannibalem  ferens,  simili  oris  de- 
honestamento.” 


388 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROHAXS 


[A.  D.  69. 


associates  lie  had  already  thrown  off  the  mask.  He  had 
summoned  the  chiefs  of  the  Batavian  and  kindred  tribes  to  a 
national  banquet  in  the  solitude  of  a sacred  grove.  He  had 
excited  them  to  the  utmost  with  wine  and  clamour,  and  in- 
flamed their  passions  by  appeals  to  their  fear,  hatred,  and 
revenge.  The  name  of  the  old  national  religion  was  invoked. 
Sacrifices  were  performed,  oaths  were  interchanged  and  rati- 
fied by  savage  rites,  such  as  their  masters  had  proscribed, 
and  vainly  endeavoured  to  suppress.  The  Frisians,  to  the 
north  of  the  Rhine,  and  the  Caninefates,  who  occupied  a por- 
tion of  the  island,  joined  in  the  projected  insurrection,  and 
were  the  first  to  rise.  TTith  a prompt  and  bold  movement 
they  dislodged  the  slender  battalions  stationed  within  their 
territories,  and  destroyed  or  captured  the  flotilla  which 
secured  the  passage  and  navigation  of  the  river.  As  soon 
as  a national  standard  was  raised,  several  squadrons  of 
German  and  Gallic  horse  went  over  from  the  Roman  camps ; 
but  the  chiefs  of  the  legions  were  in  fact  well  disposed  tow- 
ards Vespasian,  and  while  they  made  this  outbreak  a pre- 
text for  retaining  their  troops  in  Gaul,  in  spite  of  the  urgent 
summons  of  Yitellius,  who  was  now  calling  for  every  man 
and  horse  for  service  in  Italy,  they  were  in  no  haste  to  crush  a 
movement  which  still  bore  at  least  the  name  of  a diversion 
in  favour  of  his  rival.  A few  precious  moments  were  thus 
gained  to  the  insurgents.  Civilis  felt  himself  strong  enough 
to  avow  his  real  objects.  He  dismissed  his  Gaulish  prisoners, 
with  injunctions  to  raise  their  friends  and  kinsmen  for  the 
liberty  of  Gaul,  and  proclaimed  openly  that  the  dominion  of 
Rome  was  about  to  pass  away,  when  the  arms  of  the  provin- 
cials, so  long  employed  against  their  own  independence, 
were  raised  once  more  in  the  cause  of  right  and  of  nature.1 
A mutiny  of  the  auxiliaries  had  never  yet  occurred  in  the 
Roman  camps  ; such  had  been  the  good  fortune,  or  such  the 

dexterous  policy,  of  the  imperators.  W hen  at 

Threatened  . _ _ , 

mutiny  of  the  last  it  came,  it  took  the  Romans  completely  by 

auxiliaries.  . ..  . . , r , J J 

surprise,  and  never  certainly  were  they  less  pre- 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  17. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


389 


pared,  either  in  material  or  moral  resources,  to  confront  it. 
It  was  the  policy  of  these  conquerors,  such  at  least  as  we  can 
trace  it  at  a later  period,  to  employ  on  each  frontier  auxiliary 
battalions  drawn  from  distant  provinces  rather  than  from 
the  immediate  neighbourhood.  On  the  Rhine,  however,  the 
aggressive  operations  of  Germanicus  and  Corbulo  had  caused 
a rapid  consumption  of  new  levies,  and  it  was  necessary  per- 
haps to  furnish  the  legions  with  an  unusual  proportion  of 
native  recruits.  But  these  armies  had  now  for  some  years 
been  confined  within  their  lines ; the  soldiers,  Roman  or 
Gallo-German,  were  not  actively  employed : the  consequence 
had  been  a general  relaxation  of  discipline  among  both 
classes,  and  the  auxiliaries  more  particularly  had  become,  we 
may  suppose,  dissatisfied  in  the  consciousness  of  their  real 
strength,  and  the  inferiority  of  their  position.  Many  circum- 
stances had  contributed  to  abate  their  respect  for  their 
masters.  The  officers  had  grown  old  in  this  distant  service, 
and  exercised  their  authority  with  feeble  hands  ; the  central 
government  itself,  impoverished  by  the  extravagance  of  the 
Caesars,  no  longer  maintained  its  administration  with  its 
ancient  vigour  and  precision  on  the  frontiers,  while  the 
knowledge  widely  spread  of  the  confusion  which  reigned  in 
Italy  created  a general  feeling  of  restlessness  and  expectation 
of  change  throughout  the  provinces.  * 

Conscious  of  these  elements  of  danger  Hordeonius  Flac- 
cus,  the  commander  of  the  Upper  province,  who  had  been 
left  with  the  chief  authority  over  all  the  forces  cwms  defeats  a 
of  the  empire  in  those  regions,  apprehended  at  in 

once  the  full  peril  of  the  crisis.  While  still  halt-  the  Batavi* 
ing  between  the  two  Roman  factions  which  divided  his 
camps,  he  saw  that  the  blow  impending  was  aimed  equally 
at  both,  and  though  he  had  at  first  given  some  countenance 
to  Civilis,  as  a presumed  Flavian  partisan,  he  was  now  anx- 
ious to  crush  the  rebel,  whatever  might  be  the  service  he 
should  thus  be  doing  to  Vitellian  interests.  From  his  head- 
quarters, placed,  we  may  suppose,  at  Moguntiacum,  he  di- 
rected Mummius  Lupercus,  at  the  head  of  two  legions,  in  the 


390 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  69. 


Lover  province,  to  cross  the  TV ahal,  and  give  the  insurgents 
battle  in  the  heart  of  their  island.1 * * *  Lupercns  was  not  want- 
ing in  energy;  he  effected  the  passage  of  the  river;  but 
while  his  right  wing  was  flanked  by  the  lukewarm  battalions 
of  the  TTbii  and  Treviri  he  incautiously  allowed  his  left  to 
be  guarded  by  a detachment  of  Batavian  horse,  who  accom- 
panied him  with  the  deliberate  intention  of  deserting  in  the 
midst  of  his  first  engagement.  Civilis,  who  seems  to  have 
purposely  allowed  his  assailant  to  get  into  the  island,  came 
forward  with  alacrity  to  the  encounter.  The  TTbii  and  Treviri 
fled  at  the  first  shock : the  Romans  were  unable  to  hold  their 
ground,  but  they  managed  to  recross  the  river  in  decent  or- 
der, and  throw  themselves  into  the  fortified  camp  of  Castra 
V etera,  one  of  the  military  stations  which  Drusus  had  plant- 
ed on  the  Lower  Rhine.5 * * 8  The  Batavians  went  over  to  him 
at  the  critical  moment. 

This  check  was  rapidly  followed  by  another  disaster. 
Eight  Batavian  cohorts  had  been  summoned  to  Rome  by 

1 Mogtmuaeum  (Maintz)  was  the  capital  of  the  Upper  Germania.  The 
frontier  of  the  two  German  provinces  (so  called  from  the  numbers  of  that  peo- 
ple transplanted  into  them  from  the  right  bank  of  the  Rhine)  has  been  variously 

drawn.  A recent  critic  (Booking,  on  HwL  Dign,  ii.  483.)  has  fixed  it  to  the 
river  Xahe  (Xava),  which  alters  the  Rhine  just  below  Bingen.  See  also  Mar- 
quardt,  in  Becker*  s Eandbuch,  in.  1.  91.  The  Xava  was  still  an  important  land- 
mark in  the  fourth  century.  Comp.  Ausonius,  2foseH,  1.  foil : 

**  Transieram  celerem  nebuloso  flumine  Xavam  . . .” 

I step  aside  to  show,  in  the  lines  that  follow,  how  much  poetical  feeling  lingered 
even  at  that  time  among  the  imitators  of  the  antique  literature.  We,  children 
of  the  mist,  may  sympathize  with  the  admiration  felt  by  a stranger  from  the 
Atlantic  coast  for  the  dry  and  clear  atmosphere  of  the  Rhine  valley : 

u Purior  hie  campis  aer,  Phoebusque  sereno 
Lumine  purpureum  resera t jam  sudus  Olympum.  . . . 

Sed  liquidum  jubar,  et  rutilam  visentlbus  sethram, 

Libera  perspic-ui  non  invidet  aura  diet” 

8 Tac.  Hist,  iv.  18.  Castra  Vetera  is  supposed  to  be  Xanten  near  Geves. 
“ Great  quantities  of  Roman  remains  have  been  dug  out  on  that  spot”  Green- 
wood, Hist.  of  the  German*,  i.  150.,  from  Guverius,  Germ.  Ant,  p.  412. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


391 


Vitellius,  and  were  already  far  advanced  on  their  ^ 

march  through  Gaul,  when  a courier  from  Civilis  ters  of  the  Eo- 
,,  . , . ,...  ..  mans. 

overtook  them  with  pressmg  solicitations  to  join 
the  cause  of  national  independence.  Their  part  was  at  once 
decided;  but,  in  order  to  veil  their  disaffection  and  secure 
the  means  of  reaching  their  armed  countrymen  in  the  North, 
they  refused  to  move  further  to  the  southward,  under  pre- 
tence of  requiring  certain  gratifications  promised  them,  as 
they  alleged,  by  Vitellius.  Hordeonius,  anxious  and  perplex- 
ed, granted  at  once  what  they  demanded ; but  they  imme- 
diately raised  their  demands,  till  they  knew  they  could  not 
be  conceded.  Refused,  they  openly  declared  that  they  would 
join  Civilis  at  all  hazards,  confiding  perhaps  in  the  signs  of 
weakness  manifested  by  their  commander.  Hordeonius  was 
indeed  at  a loss  what  course  to  take.  At  first  he  proposed 
to  employ  force,  and  march  against  them;  again  he  shut 
himself  up  in  his  camp  and  would  have  let  things  take  their 
course.  His  officers  urged  and  almost  compelled  him  to  act, 
and  at  last  he  ordered  Herennius  Gallus,  legate  of  the  First 
legion,  to  close  the  road  northward  at  Bonna,  where  he  was 
stationed.  At  the  same  time  he  announced  that  he  was  about 
to  follow  the  revolted  squadrons  in  person,  and  co-operate 
with  Gallus  in  crushing  them  between  the  two  divisions  of 
his  army.  Once  more,  however,  the  prefect  abandoned  his 
bolder  counsels : the  Batavians  approaching  Bonna  sent  to 
parley  with  Gallus,  who,  deserted  by  his  chief,  hesitated  to 
interpose.  Nevertheless  his  legion  rushed  forward  to  the 
combat,  and  might  have  overpowered  the  advancing  Bata- 
vians, but  for  the  defection  of  their  Belgic  auxiliaries.  A 
third  Roman  force  was  thus  beaten  with  disgrace,  and  driven 
behind  its  ramparts.  Passing  rapidly  before  the  encamp- 
ment, and  leaving  the  Colonia  Agrippinensis  on  their  right, 
the  victorious  Batavians  pressed  resolutely  forward,  and  with 
no  further  check  effected  a junction  with  the  battalions  of 
Civilis.1 

The  forces  of  the  Gaulish  champion  now  assumed  the  pro- 
1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  19,  20. 


392 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


portions  of  a regular  army;  but  though  the  liberty  of  Gaul 
Civiiis  beieag-  and  Germany  was  the  common  watchword  of  the 
steationeo?Cas-n  confederates,  he  still  chose  to  represent  himself 
tra  Vetera.  jn  parley  with  the  Romans,  as  a partisan  of  Ves- 
pasian.1 He  invited  the  legions  of  Vetera  to  take  the  oath 
to  the  same  imperator  to  whom,  as  he  declared,  he  had  sworn 
his  own  auxiliary  detachments.  But  the  Romans  under  Lu- 
percus  were  faithful  to  Vitellius : they  replied  to  the  sum- 
mons of  the  Batavians  with  indignant  menaces,  repaired  their 
defences,  and  awaited  the  onset  of  his  barbarians.  They 
destroyed  the  town  which  had  grown  up  beneath  the  walls 
of  their  encampment ; they  stored  their  quarters  with  pro- 
visions pillaged  from  the  country  round,  and  resorted  to  all 
the  means  of  military  science  to  repel  the  attack  of  an 
enemy,  well  armed,  well  trained,  and  ably  handled.  The 
rebels  assailed,  the  legionaries  defended  the  camp  with  equal 
skill  and  obstinacy,  but  while  anxiously  expecting  aid  from 
their  general,  the  Romans  succeeded  in  maintaining  their 
fortified  position.  One  legion  indeed,  the  Eighteenth,  was 
despatched  from  the  Upper  province  under  Dillius  Vocula; 
but  Hordeonius  still  hesitated  to  put  himself  in  motion.  His 
own  soldiers  grew  impatient,  indignant,  insubordinate.  Let- 
ters reached  him  from  Vespasian,  inviting  him  to  join  his 
faction ; but  uproar  spread  through  the  ranks,  and  he  could 
only  read  them  in  public  in  order  to  reject  and  condemn  them, 
and  send  the  courier  who  had  brought  them  in  chains  to  Vi- 
tellius.2 

Active  operations  were  necessary  to  confirm  this  pretence 
of  zeal.  Hordeonius  began  at  last  to  march.  At  Bonna  he 
was  met  by  the  reproaches  of  the  defeated  le- 

Mutinous  riots  . . " x . i • • 

among  the  Eo-  gionaries,  who  ascribed  their  disaster  to  ms  mac- 
man  soldiery.  or  even  to  his  bad  faith.  In  reply,  he  re- 

cited the  letters  he  had  written  to  all  parts  of  Gaul,  Spain, 
and  Britain,  demanding  assistance  ; and,  to  prove  his  author- 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  21. : “ Civiiis,  justi  jam  exercitus  ductor,  sed  consilii  ambi- 
guus  . . . cunctos  in  verba  Yespasiani  adigit.” 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  21-24. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


393 


ity,  caused  one  of  the  murmurers  to  he  put  under  arrest. 
From  Bonna  he  proceeded  to  Colonia,  the  appointed  rendez- 
vous of  the  auxiliaries  he  had  summoned  to  the  standards  of 
Vitellius.  But  the  soldiers,  full  of  ardour  themselves,  were 
disgusted  with  the  weakness  or  treachery  of  their  leader,  and 
compelled  him  to  relinquish  the  command  to  Yocula,  whose 
promptness  and  fidelity  seemed  equally  beyond  question. 
This  insubordination,  however,  as  usual,  was  the  harbinger 
of  ill-success.  The  Roman  forces,  as  they  advanced  towards 
Yetera,  were  harassed  by  scarceness  of  provisions  ; their  pay 
was  irregular ; the  distant  states  of  Gaul  were  slack  in  re- 
mitting to  them  the  men  and  money  they  required;  the 
waters  of  the  Rhine  fell  so  low  that  their  vessels  could  with 
difficulty  continue  their  route  down  the  stream,  and  the  ter- 
rors of  superstition,  which  beheld  in  this  drought  the  anger 
of  the  gods,  aggravated  the  hardships  of  their  situation. 
Yocula  now  joined  his  forces  to  the  Thirteenth  legion  at 
Rovesium;  but  not  feeling  himself  sufficiently  strong  to  at- 
tempt the  relief  of  Yetera,  he  employed  and  sought  to  ani- 
mate his  men  with  camp-exercises,  and  by  the  plunder  of  the 
Gugerni,  who  had  taken  part  with  Civilis.  The  hostile  Ger- 
mans were  watching  these  proceedings  from  the  other  side 
of  the  Rhine.  A vessel  laden  with  corn  happened  to  take 
ground  in  the  shallow  channel,  and  they  prepared  to  bring  it 
over  to  their  own  bank.  Gallus,  who  had  been  left  in  camp 
at  Gelduba,  while  Yocula  was  engaged  in  his  foray,  observ- 
ing this  movement,  sent  a cohort  to  prevent  it.  The  Ger- 
mans received  succours,  and  a skirmish  ensued,  in  which  they 
gained  the  advantage,  and  succeeded  in  carrying  off  their 
prize.  The  beaten  legionaries  imputed  ill-faith  to  their  com- 
manders ; they  dragged  Gallus  out  of  his  tent,  tore  his  robes, 
and  struck  him  with  many  blows,  demanding  what  price  he 
had  received  for  his  treachery,  and  who  were  his  associates 
in  it.  Thence  they  turned  upon  Hordeonius,  who  still  re- 
mained, though  divested  of  authority,  in  the  camp,  and 
threw  him  into  chains,  from  which  he  was  not  released  till 
Yocula’s  return.  This  chief  had  the  power  to  restore  obedi- 


394 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


ence.  He  put  the  ringleaders  in  the  mutiny  to  death.  Such 
was  the  rapid  change  of  feeling  among  the  soldiers ; so  easily 
were  they  excited  to  sedition,  so  promptly  restored  to  the  in- 
stinct of  military  submission.  While,  in  fact,  the  officers 
were  for  the  most  part  well  disposed  towards  Vespasian,  as 
a brave  and  able  captain,  whose  reputation  pronounced  him 
worthy  of  leading  them,  the  men  were  generally  attached 
to  Vitellius,  whom  they  knew,  and  liked  perhaps  for  his 
largesses,  or  his  remiss  discipline.  But  as  long  as  they  could 
be  made  to  believe  that  their  chiefs  were  faithful  to  this  fa- 
vourite, they  consented  to  execute  their  orders  and  endure 
their  chastisements.1 

The  great  mass  of  the  German  tribes,  on  either  side  of  the 
Rhine,  now  attached  themselves  to  the  fortunes  of  Civilis ; 

and  a general  attack  was  made,  by  his  direction, 

The  siege  of  ® ..  ’ J 7 

Vetera  turned  upon  the  unfortunate  TJbii,  whose  long  hdelity 

to  the  Romans  rendered  them  hateful  to  their 
less  pliant  compatriots.  Their  country  between  the  Rhor 
and  the  Rhine — from  Juliers  to  Bingen — was  ravaged  with 
fire  and  sword,  except  where  it  was  under  the  immediate 
protection  of  the  Roman  garrisons ; but  the  strong  defences 
of  Colonia  defied  the  fury  of  the  barbarians,  and  Civilis  now 
collected  all  his  energies  for  pressing  the  siege  of  Vetera, 
which  he  had  kept  throughout  under  strict  blockade.  The 
Batavians  were  charged  with  the  service  of  the  battering 
machines : the  Germans  from  the  right  bank,  more  impetu- 
ous, and  whose  lives  were  held  perhaps  cheaper,  were  des- 
tined for  the  assault  on  the  entrenchments.  A furious  attack 
was  made ; but  the  defence  was  steadily  maintained,  and 
through  the  darkness  of  the  night,  illumined  only  by  the 
glare  of  torches  and  blazing  ruins,  both  parties  exhausted 
every  effort  of  skill  and  bravery,  till  the  despair  rather  than 
the  science  of  the  Romans  gained  the  ascendency.  Civilis 
resumed  the  blockade,  and  contented  himself  with  attempts 
to  corrupt  the  enemy  who  had  baffled  his  arms.2 


1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  25-27. 


2 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  30. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


395 


Such  was  the  posture  of  affairs  on  the  hanks  of  the  Rhine, 
when  late  in  the  autumn  accounts  arrived  of  the  defeat  of  the 
Vitellians  at  Cremona,  the  proclamation  of  Yes-  Envoys  sent  to 
pasian  by  Primus,  and  the  invitation  of  Csecina 
to  the  remnant  of  the  beaten  party  to  accede  to  Pasian- 
this  change  of  government.  Hordeonius  once  more  took  upon 
himself  to  play  the  part  of  general,  and  required  his  legions 
to  swear  to  the  new  Imperator.  The  Gaulish  auxiliaries, 
indifferent  in  truth  to  either  chief,  made  no  difficulty  in 
obeying  ; but  the  legionaries  still  hesitated.  At  last,  when 
constrained  to  acquiesce,  they  pronounced  the  oath  slowly 
and  reluctantly,  and  slurred  over  the  name  of  Vespasian  with 
indistinct  murmurs.  From  the  Roman  camps  the  envoys  of 
Primus  passed  to  the  lines  of  Civilis,  and  claimed  him  as 
their  master’s  avowed  ally.  The  Batavian  replied  at  first 
evasively;  but  the  envoys  were  themselves  Gauls,  and  he 
was  emboldened,  on  further  intercourse,  to  open  to  them  the 
real  object  of  the  armed  attitude  he  had  assumed,  recounting 
the  sufferings  and  indignities  he  had  undergone,  and  invok- 
ing them  to  join  him  in  delivering  their  common  country 
from  the  tyranny  of  the  stranger.  Their  fate,  he  said,  could 
not  become  worse  than  it  already  was ; victory  might  restore 
them  to  liberty.  With  this  he  dismissed  them,  having  suc- 
ceeded, it  would  seem,  in  shaking  their  fidelity,  and  at  least 
disposed  them  to  conceal  his  own  avowed  hostility.1 

Trusting  that  Yocula  would  be  thrown  off  his  guard  by 
the  false  report  of  these  emissaries,  the  Batavian  now  pre- 
pared to  strike  a furious  blow.  Still  keeping 

° He  makes  a 

watch  m person  before  Vetera,  he  detached  a sudden  attack 

, „ ..  on  the  Komans. 

body  ot  picked  troops,  who,  after  surprising  a 
Roman  squadron  in  its  quarters  at  Asciburgium,  presented 
themselves  before  the  camp  so  suddenly  that  Vocula  had  not 
time  to  make  the  usual  address  to  his  men,  nor  even  to  draw 
them  out  in  battle  array.2  In  such  emergencies  the  Roman 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  32. 

2 Asciburgium,  perhaps  the  modern  Asburg,  between  Neuss  and  Xanten 
(Novesium  and  Vetera).  Smith’s  Diet  of  Class.  Geography. 


396 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


tactics  allowed  of  but  one  manoeuvre : the  legionaries  were 
mustered  rapidly  in  the  centre,  the  auxiliaries  hastened  to 
occupy  the  space  on  their  flanks.  From  between  the  ranks 
of  these  ill-formed  battalions  the  cavalry  charged  the  foe ; 
but  the  Germans  received  them  with  steady  valour,  and 
drove  them  back  on  their  own  lines.  The  Romans  were 
shaken  by  the  rebound,  and  cut  down  by  the  advancing 
Germans  with  great  slaughter:  at  the  same  moment  the 
Rervian  cohorts  went  over  to  their  countrymen,  and  left  one 
flank  of  the  legionaries  unprotected.  Assailed  on  two  sides, 
the  troops  of  Yocula  broke  and  fled,  leaving  their  colours 
behind  them,  and  were  chased  to  their  entrenchments.  The 
day  would  have  ended  in  the  destruction  of  the  routed  army, 
but  for  the  arrival  of  some  cohorts  of  Yascon  auxiliaries, 
whose  slender  strength  was  unknown  to  the  excited  victors, 
and  whom  they  supposed  to  be  the  van  of  a long  column 
from  Rovesium  or  Moguntiacum.  The  Germans  were  ulti- 
mately driven  back,  with  the  sacrifice  of  their  most  forward 
warriors ; but  their  horsemen  carried  off  the  standards  and 
captives.  The  Romans  lost  the  greater  number  in  the  action, 
but  the  Germans  lost  their  best  men.1 

Civilis  and  Yocula  had  both  made  mistakes.  The  one 
ought  to  have  supported  so  daring  an  attack  with  a larger 
Success  of  the  force,  in  which  case  the  appearance  of  a few 
momentkry^e-  auxiliaries  would  not  have  turned  the  fortune  of 
lief  of  Vetera.  ^ay  . the  negligence  of  the  other,  and  the 

ease  with  which  he  had  suffered  himself  to  be  deceived  by 
imperfect  information,  were  unpardonable ; nor  did  he  now 
take  advantage  of  his  assailant’s  discouragement  to  raise  the 
blockade  of  Yetera.  Civilis  had  notified  to  the  besieged 
that  he  had  gained  a great  victory : they  might  the  more 
readily  believe  him  when  they  saw  the  captives  and  the 
standards  he  paraded  before  their  walls.  But  one  of  the 
prisoners  exclaimed  with  a loud  voice  that  the  Romans  were 
really  the  conquerors  ; and  though  the  brave  soldier  was  im- 


1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  33. 


A.  U.  822.  J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


397 


mediately  cut  down  by  bis  captors,  bis  countrymen  took 
heart  from  tbe  assurance  thus  conveyed  to  them.  At  the 
same  moment  the  flames  of  burning  villages  betokened  the 
advance  of  the  legions  to  their  relief.  Yocula,  on  arriving 
at  the  spot,  ordered  his  men  to  entrench  a camp  for  their 
baggage,  preparatory  to  the  attack;  but  they  were  impa- 
tient of  labour  and  eager  for  the  fray,  and  with  menacing 
cries  compelled  him  to  launch  them,  in  loose  marching  order, 
upon  the  enemy.  Civilis  received  them  gallantly  : he  trusted 
to  the  blunders  of  his  assailant  as  much  as  to  his  own  prowess. 
The  mutinous  Romans  had  lost,  indeed,  with  their  discipline 
no  slight  portion  of  their  courage.  They  would  have  been 
speedily  overpowered ; but,  at  their  cry  for  succour,  their  be- 
sieged comrades  poured  forth,  and  the  brave  Batavian 
happening  to  be  thrown  to  the  ground  by  his  horse  falling, 
both  sides  believed  him  slain.  The  Germans  paused  in  con- 
sternation ; the  Romans  redoubled  blow  on  blow  with  re- 
newed vigour.  Vetera  was  effectually  relieved ; but  Vocula 
again  neglected  to  follow  up  his  victory,  contenting  himself 
-with  strengthening  the  defences  now  no  longer  threatened. 
He  was  suspected,  nor,  it  is  said,  unjustly,  of  a corrupt 
understanding  with  the  enemy.  Though  he  strengthened 
the  works  of  Vetera,  he  drafted  a thousand  men  from  the 
legion  which  held  it,  and  withdrew  his  forces  successively  to 
Gelduba  and  Novesium.  Want  of  provisions  may  have 
urged  him  thus  to  reduce  the  garrison,  for  the  country  was 
ravaged  far  and  near,  and  the  Germans  commanded  the 
stream  of  the  Rhine.  Moreover  the  baggage  and  crowds  of 
sick,  wounded,  and  unarmed,  who  were  to  he  removed  to  the 
safer  station  of  Vovesium,  required  a considerable  escort; 
and  finally  great  numbers  of  the  garrison  demanded  imperi- 
ously to  be  relieved  from  the  hardships  they  had  so  long 
endured  within  the  lines,  while  those  who  were  left  behind 
complained  that  they  were  deserted.1 

The  forces  of  Civilis  closed  once  more  round  the  devoted 


1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  34,  35. 


398 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  69. 


entrenchments,  while  Vocula  made  the  best  of  his  way  to 
Gelduba  and  FTovesium.  He  gained  the  advan- 

Furthermu-  . ° 

tinies,  siaugh-  tage  m a skirmish  of  cavalry  on  the  way,  but  this 

ter  of  Hordeo-  ° J 

nins  Fiaccus,  success  did  not  improve  the  temper  and  conduct 

and  break-up  ....  _ . . . 

of  a Eoman  of  his  unsteady  battalions.  When  divisions  from 
several  legions  were  reunited  at  Novesium,  hear- 
ing that  treasure  had  been  sent  to  the  camp  by  Yitellius, 
they  combined  to  demand  a donative.  Hordeonius  consented 
to  surrender  the  contents  of  his  chest,  but  only  in  the  name 
of  Vespasian.  The  soldiers  divided  the  money,  ate  and 
drank,  filled  the  camp  with  uproar,  met  in  crowds  at  night, 
and  finally,  remembering  their  old  grudge  against  their 
general,  burst  into  his  tent,  dragged  him  from  his  couch, 
and  slew  him.  Vocula  would  have  suffered  the  same  fate, 
had  he  not  escaped  in  the  garb  of  a slave.  Left  without  a 
commander  the  soldiers  lost  all  discipline.  They  sent  some 
of  their  officers  to  implore  aid  from  the  Gaulish  states ; but 
in  the  meanwhile  the  army  itself  broke  up  into  sections  ; the 
men  of  the  Upper  province  separated  themselves  from  those 
of  the  Lower ; both  retreated,  or  rather  fled  in  disorder  before 
Civilis,  who  was  hastening  to  attack  them.  Some  cohorts 
insisted  on  replacing  the  images  of  Vitellius  in  the  Belgian 
camps  and  cities,  though  Vitellius  was  now  known  to  be  dead. 
Finally  the  men  of  the  First,  the  Fourth,  and  the  Eighteenth 
legions,  who  belonged  to  the  army  of  the  Upper  province, 
put  themselves  again  under  Vocula’s  orders,  and  allowed 
him  to  lead  them  to  the  relief  of  Moguntiacum,  which  was 
surrounded  by  a swarm  of  Germans  from  the  Mayn  and 
Heckar.  That  important  post  was  thus  saved  to  the  empire. 
But  the  barbarians  had  spread  themselves  far  inland  on  the 
left  bank  of  the  Rhine,  and  the  Treviri,  abandoned  by  their 
Roman  defenders,  were  obliged  to  fight  for  their  own  homes, 
and  protect  their  country  with  a long  line  of  wall  and  en- 
trenchment.1 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  36,  37. : “ Loricam  vallumque  per  fines  suos  Treviri  strux- 
ere.”  The  lorica,  in  this  place,  as  I understand  it,  a continuous  wall  running 
along  the  ridge  of  a mound,  is  well  illustrated  from  Q.  Curtius  (ix.  4.)  by  Stei- 
ninger,  Gesch.  der  Trevirer,  p.  187.:  “ Angusta  muri  corona  erat : non  pinnae 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


399 


Had  the  news  of  Vitellius’  death  reached  the  seat  of  war 
a little  sooner,  the  great  fortress  of  Moguntiacum,  the  firm- 
est stronghold  of  the  Roman  power  in  the  North,  Triumphant 
would  in  all  probability  have  been  lost.  When  of^KS^ted 
Antonius  Primus,  a Gaul  of  Tolosa,  standing  Gauls* 
amid  the  ruins  of  the  Capitol,  proclaimed  that  the  empire 
had  passed  away  from  the  puppet  of  the  Rhenish  legions, 
there  arose  a cry  throughout  the  Transalpine  province  that 
Rome’s  conquering  destiny  was  broken,  and  the  shrine  of  her 
invincible  gods,  which  the  Gauls,  when  they  burnt  the  city, 
had  been  unable  to  storm,  had  fallen  by  the  hands  of  the 
Romans  themselves.  The  outposts  of  the  empire  on  the 
Danube,  it  was  affirmed,  were  besieged  by  the  Dacians  and 
Samatians : a great  revolt  was  announced  in  Britain : the 
Druids,  raising  once  more  their  venerable  heads,  declared 
that  the  dominion  of  the  world  was  passing  to  the  Gauls,  to 
the  race  whose  conquering  hordes  had  peopled  Britain,  had 
occupied  Spain,  had  colonized  Italy,  overrun  Greece,  and 
founded  states  under  the  shadow  of  the  Caucasus.1  It  was 
pretended  moreover  that  certain  Gaulish  chiefs,  whom  Otho 
had  armed  against  Vitellius,  had  vowed,  should  Roman 
affairs  fall  hopelessly  into  confusion,  not  to  be  wanting  to  the 
liberation  of  their  country.2 

Before  the  death  of  Hordeonius  Flaccus  nothing  had  oc- 
curred to  unmask  their  secret  anticipations.  But  when  the 
legionaries  had  actually  slain  them  general,  when 

,,  ...  OivUis  commu- 

the  provincials,  abandoned  by  their  protectors,  nicateswith 

n -i,  J „ ,7  disaffected  aux- 

were  forced  to  cling  together  for  their  own  de-  Varies  in  the 
fence,  Civilis  felt  that  his  time  was  come,  and  Eomai1  camp‘ 

(battlements)  sicut  alibi  fastigium  ejus  distinxerant ; sed  perpetua  lorica  ob- 
ducta  transitum  sepserat.”  Steininger,  however,  himself  regards'the  lorica  and 
vallum  as  distinct  lines  of  fortification,  which  he  traces  along  the  hills  on  the 
left  side  of  the  Moselle  valley,  from  near  Treves  to  Andemach. 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  54. : “ Captam  olim  a Gallis  Urbem,  sed  integra  Jovis  sede 
mansisse  imperium : fatali  nuncigne  signum  coelestis  irae  datum,  et  possessionem 
rerum  humanarum  Transalpinis  gentibus  portendi,  superstitione  vana  Druidae 
canebant.”  Tacitus  has  skilfully  brought  in  this  account  immediately  after  his 
narrative  of  the  destruction  of  the  Capitol. 

2 Tac.  he.:  “ Pepigisse  ne  deessent  libertati.” 


400 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


began  to  communicate  bis  views  to  Classicus,  a Gaulish  offi- 
cer commanding  a squadron  of  Treviri.  In  the  conferences 
between  them  two  other  Gauls  of  distinction  took  part, 
Julius  Tutor,  a Treviran,  and  Julius  Sabinus,  a Lingon,  who, 
while  conspiring  for  the  independence  of  Gaul,  affected  to 
boast  his  descent  from  Julius  Caesar,  the  bravest  of  the  Ro- 
mans. These  men  had  frequent  meetings  at  Colonia,  but  in 
private,  for  the  Ubii  generally  retained  their  fidelity  to  Rome. 
They  sounded  the  disposition  of  the  auxiliaries,  and  of  the 
tribes  around  them,  and  pledged  themselves  to  the  liberation 
of  their  common  country,  convinced  that  when  once  the 
passes  of  the  Alps  were  closed  against  the  invader,  the  Gaul- 
ish states  might  concert  among  themselves  what  limits  they 
would  set  to  their  power.1 2  Then,  returning  to  their  quarters, 
they  joined  as  before  the  standards  of  Yocula,  who  now  moved 
again  down  the  Rhine  to  succour  the  troops  still  blockaded 
at  Yetera.  They  were  only  watching  their  opportunity. 
Suddenly  they  quitted  the  ranks  with  their  divisions,  and  en- 
trenched themselves  at  a distance.  Neither  threats  nor  en- 
treaties could  induce  them  to  return.  Yocula  was  not  strong 
enough  to  enforce  obedience,  and  retired  in  perplexity  to 
Novesium.  Meanwhile  the  legionaries  themselves  wavered 
in  their  fidelity.  The  death  of  Yitellius,  the  accession  of 
Yespasian,  the  disorders  of  the  Empire,  all  combined  to  alarm 
them ; and,  Gauls  as  they  were  by  birth,  or  Gallicized  by 
their  long  sojourn  on  Gaulish  soil,  they  were  persuaded  to 
the  crime  never  before  conceived  by  Roman  legionaries,  of 
swearing  the  oath  of  the  stranger?  Yocula,  driven  to  de- 
spair by  this  defection  of  his  soldiers,  was  only  prevented  by 
his  attendants  from  despatching  himself ; but  his  life  was 
shortly  taken  by  the  emissaries  of  Classicus.  The  officers 
next  to  him  in  command,  Numisius  and  Gallus,  were  thrown 
into  chains,  and  carried  to  the  camp  of  Civilis.  Legionaries 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  65. : “Si  Alpes  praesidiis  firmentur,  coalita  libertate,  dispec- 
turas  Gallias  quem  yirium  suarum  terminum  velint.” 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  57. : “ TJt,  flagitium  incognitum,  Romanus  exercitus  in  ex- 
terna verba  juraret.” 


A.  U.  822. J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


401 


and  auxiliaries  united  in  one  body  with  the  host  of  Germans 
and  Batavians,  and  all  pledged  themselves  together  to  the 
empire  of  the  Gauls.1  The  garrison  of  Vetera,  Capitulation 
the  remnant  of  the  army  of  the  Lower  province,  and  treacherous 
were  once  more  summoned  to  surrender.  Hope-  garrison  of  Ve- 
less  of  relief,  reduced  in  numbers,  and  driven  to 
extremity  by  famine,  they  accepted  terms  of  capitulation. 
Their  lives  were  promised  them ; but  they  were  required  to 
swear  the  Gaulish  oath,  and  surrender  their  camp  to  pillage. 
After  this  humiliation  they  were  led  beyond  the  Gaulish 
lines,  still  menaced  and  insulted  by  their  conductors  ; but  at 
five  miles’  distance  from  the  scene  of  their  brave  defence  they 
were  attacked  by  the  faithless  foe,  and  put  to  the  sword. 
After  thus  absorbing  one  Homan  army,  and  utterly  destroy- 
ing another,  Civilis  cut  the  long  ruddy  locks,  which  he  had 
vowed  to  let  grow  untrimmed  till  he  should  consummate  his 
vengeance  on  the  enemies  of  his  country.2 

The  Roman  power  was  thus  suddenly  overthrown  along 
the  whole  bank  of  the  Rhine ; and  all  the  camps  and  military 
stations  of  the  legions  were  destroyed,  with  the 

_ 3 . Civilis  seeks  to 

exception  oi  Moguntiacum,  and  Vmdomssa  at  form  a German 

_ . . sovereignty  at 

the  entrance  ot  the  Helvetian  territory,  which  it  Coionia  Agrip- 
seems  were  still  occupied  by  weak  and  trem-  pmensis‘ 
bling  garrisons.  A wing  of  the  captured  Sixteenth  broke 
away  and  took  refuge  in  Moguntiacum  ; the  main  body  was 
marched  under  Gaulish  colours  to  the  city  of  the  Treviri, 
and  exhibited  to  the  people  in  token  of  the  complete  victory 
their  champions  had  obtained  for  them.  The  German  allies 
of  Civilis  urged  him  to  destroy  the  colony  of  Agrippina, 
which  they  justly  regarded  as  a standing  menace  to  their 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  59. : “ Juravere,  qui  aderant,  pro  imperio  Galliarum.” 

2 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  55-61.  As  in  his  account  of  the  British  insurrection,  so  in 
this  also,  Tacitus  is  generally  reticent  as  to  the  atrocities  committed,  we  must 
presume,  by  semi-barbarians,  with  arms  in  their  hands,  excited  by  the  supe- 
riority suddenly  acquired  over  the  people  before  whom  they  were  used  to  trem- 
ble. He  adds,  however,  here  a report  that  Civilis  set  up  some  -of  his  captives 

for  his  child  to  shoot  at. 


vol.  vi. — 26 


402 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


nation.  But  to  this  measure  their  chief  would  not  consent. 
From  no  motive  of  humanity,  it  may  be  presumed,  nor  to 
gain  a reputation  for  clemency,  but  reserving  the  place  for 
the  central  stronghold  of  his  own  power ; for  it  was  observ- 
ed that  he  had  never  himself  pronounced,  nor  suffered  his 
Batavians  to  pronounce,  the  oath  to  the  Gaulish  empire,  and 
he  contemplated  putting  himself  at  the  head  of  a confederacy 
His  deference  of  German  tribes  on  either  side  of  the  Rhine. 
prophetessman  With  this  view  he  paid  court  to  Yeleda,  the  vir- 
Veieda,  gin  queen  and  priestess  of  the  Bructeri,  who 

dwelt  aloof  in  a tower  on  the  Lippe,  and  whom  they  were 
wont  to  consult  and  worship  with  superstitious  awe.1 * * * *  To 
her  he  had  sent  Lupercus,  the  choicest  of  his  captives,  as  a 
pledge  of  the  triumph  she  had  promised  him ; slain  by  his 
attendants  on  the  way,  the  Roman  general  escaped  the  more 
solemn  sacrifice  to  which  he  had  probably  been  destined. 
Civilis  showed  no  disposition  to  advance  further  to  pursue  or 
meet  the  Romans.  He  was  intent  on  consolidating  his  au- 
thority in  the  regions  his  arms  had  already  won.  Sabinus, 
more  bold,  or  more  impatient,  led  his  forces  into  the  country 
of  the  Sequani ; but  while  affecting  to  war  for  the  independ- 
ence of  Gaul,  he  had  himself  assumed  the  title  of  Caesar, 
and  was  surprised  to  find  the  people  indifferent  to  what  ap- 
peared to  them  a mere  change  of  masters.  Tribe 

Julius  Sabinus  r . & 

defeated  by  the  was  marshalled  against  tribe,  and  the  result  was 

Sequani.  . . 1 ° . 

a victory  of  the  Sequani  over  the  Lmgones.  ba- 
binus  himself  showed  neither  courage  nor  conduct.  Flying 
from  the  field  at  the  first  turn  of  fortune,  he  made  his  way 
to  a neighbouring  farm  house,  and  set  it  on  fire,  while  he  es- 
caped into  the  woods,  to  make  it  appear  that  he  had  destroy- 
ed himself.  The  stratagem  succeeded ; he  was  supposed  to 
be  dead,  and  soon  forgotten  by  both  parties ; but  we  shall 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  61.  Comp.  Germ.  8.:  “ Veledam  diu  apud  plerosque  numi- 

nis  loco  habitam.”  Not  Yeleda  only,  but  Aurinia,  and  other  women,  had  been 

venerated  hy  the  superstition  of  the  Germans  as  goddesses.  “ Inesse  quin 

etiam  sanctum  aliquid  et  providum  putant ; nec  aut  consilia  earum  aspernantur, 

aut  responsa  negligunt.”  Comp.  Caesar,  Bell.  Gall.  i.  60. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


403 


presently  hear  of  him  again  in  an  affecting  story  which  gives 
more  interest  to  his  name,  than,  from  his  character,  it  de- 
serves.1 

The  Flavian  generals  had  not  yet  drawn  breath  from  the 
efforts  and  anxieties  of  the  war  in  Italy,  when  they  were  ap- 
palled by  the  report  of  so  many  legions  lost  and  Fresh  forces  al- 
so many  provinces  revolted  in  the  North.  Mu-  GaSfrom11 
cianus  may  have  felt  these  disasters  more  bit- 
terly,  when  he  reflected  that  he  had  himself  en-  miti£U1* 
couraged  Civilis  to  rise  in  Vespasian’s  name  against  the 
defenders  of  the  empire,  and  that  the  Batavian  had  only  bet- 
tered the  lesson  in  perfidy  which  he  had  taught  him.  But 
this  was  not  a moment  for  vain  regrets.  It  was  necessary 
to  strengthen  by  the  presence  of  an  imposing  force  the 
Transalpine  states  which  still  leaned  to  the  side  of  Rome. 
In  Gaul  no  Roman  forces  were  left.  Two  legions  of  the  vic- 
torious Flavian  army,  the  Eighth  and  the  Eleventh,  were 
immediately  sent  forward  from  Italy.  These  were  accompa- 
nied by  one  of  the  most  recently  levied  of  the  Vitellian  le- 
gions, the  Twenty-first.  The  Sixth  and  Tenth  were  sum- 
moned from  Spain,  and  the  Fourteenth  recalled  from  Britain. 
The  command  of  these  divisions  when  combined  was  assigned 
to  Petilius  Cerialis,  an  experienced  but  not  an  active  general, 
already  known  to  us  from  the  wars  in  Britain ; and  Domitian 
himself  followed  in  their  rear,  to  reap  the  glory  of  their  suc- 
cess, if  not  to  share  their  perils  in  person.  As  soon  as  it 
was  known  that  forces  so  considerable  were  converging  on 
the  theatre  of  war,  the  patriotic  fervour  of  the  Gauls  sig- 
nally abated.  Deputies  from  various  states  assembled  in  the 
territory  of  the  Remi,  a people  who  from  the  first  had  shown 
a disposition  to  acquiesce  in  the  foreign  domination.  The 
decision  of  this  congress  was  quickly  taken.  The  Treviri 
were  required  to  lay  down  their  arms,  and  seek  by  prompt 
submission  the  pardon  which  further  resistance  might  render 
unattainable.  Valentinus,  the  envoy  from  this  tribe,  who 


1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  61-67. 


404 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


still  gave  his  voice  for  war,  and  dissuaded  his  countrymen 
from  obeying  this  mandate,  lost  in  arguing  and  haranguing 
the  time  which  should  have  been  devoted  to  active  prepara- 
tions. Civilis  was  wasting  his  strength  in  tri- 

The  Gauls  neg-  . ° & 

lect  to  defend  flmg  expeditions ; Classicus  was  supine : and  Tutor 

tlic  entrance  ~ ; ^ 

into  their  conn-  neglected  to  seize  the  passes  of  the  Alps,  and 
guard  the  gates  of  Upper  Germany.  The  fairest 
chance  ever  offered  to  a province  for  recovering  its  liberty 
was  lost,  it  would  seem,  by  the  inefficiency  of  its  self-consti- 
tuted champions.  While  the  Gauls  were  trifling  the  Romans 
were  acting  with  an  energy  which,  even  at  this  distance 
of  time,  cannot  but  strike  us  with  awe.  Such  men  were 
indeed  their  own  destiny.  Day  by  day,  and  month  by 
month,  the  legions  advanced,  tramping  eight  hundred  thou- 
sand paces  along  the  marble  roads  of  the  empire.  They  trav- 
ersed half  the  length  of  Italy  to  the  foot  of  the  Alps.  There 
they  divided  into  two  bodies ; one  took  the  route  of  the 
Graian  mountains  into  the  heart  of  Gaul ; the  other  scaled 
the  walls  of  the  Great  St.  Bernard,  alighted  on  the  Leman 
Lake,  skirted  its  eastern  extremity  to  Yiviscus  or  Yevay, 
and  from  thence,  still  following  the  beaten  track  of  four  gen- 
erations of  conquerors,  climbed  the  northern  ridge  of  that 
hollow  basin,  and  descended  again  to  Aventicum  in  the  val- 
ley of  the  Aar.  The  descent  was  now  easy,  and  every  omen 
favourable.  At  Yindonissa  the  avenging  army  was  met  by 
auxiliaries  who  had  penetrated  Helvetia  by  the  passes  of  the 
Splugen,  and  it  swept  along,  in  its  onward  march,  allies  from 
Rhaetia  and  Brigantia.  Thus  reinforced,  the  Twenty-first 
legion,  under  Sextilius  Felix,  entered  Upper  Germany  by 
the  valley  of  the  Rhine.1  When  Tutor  sent  against  it  some 
of  the  revolted  legionaries,  who  had  taken  service  with  the 
Gauls,  these  dastardly  soldiers  returned,  with  a second 
treachery,  to  the  eagles  again.  He  retired,  keeping  clear  of 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  70.:  “Cum  auxiliaribus  cohortibus  per  Rbsetiam  inrupere: 
accepit  ala  singularium  . . . praeerat  Julius  Briganticus.”  This  native  chief 
was,  I conceive,  from  his  name,  from  Bregenz  on  the  lake  of  Constance.  I ven- 
ture to  coin  an  appellation  for  his  country. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


405 


Moguntiacum  with  its  little  Roman  garrison,  and  occupied 
Bingium,  where  he  hoped  to  he  able  to  maintain  himself  by 
breaking  the  bridge  oyer  the  Nahe,  which  flows  before  it. 
But  the  Romans  swam  or  waded  the  stream,  at-  Successes  of 
tacked  him  in  his  unfortified  position,  and  easily  the  Eomans- 
routed  his  disconcerted  militia.  The  spirit  of  the  Treviri, 
long  reduced  to  inactivity  by  the  policy  of  their  conquerors, 
was  broken  by  one  defeat.  Their  warriors  threw  away  their 
arms,  and  dispersed ; their  chiefs  for  the  most  part  hastened 
to  submit.  The  Vitellian  legions,  which,  after  joining  the 
standard  of  Civilis,  had  been  quartered  among  them,  swore 
of  their  own  accord  in  the  name  of  Vespasian,  but  still  re- 
frained from  offering  him  their  arms,  and  retired  moodily  to 
a distance.1 

At  this  crisis  there  seems  to  have  been  some  delay  in  the 
movements  of  the  Romans.  Possibly  their  forces,  collected 
from  such  distant  quarters,  were  not  yet  concen- 
trated. Valentinus  exerted  all  his  influence  to 
revive  the  courage  of  the  Treviri,  and  assisted 
Tutor  in  rallying  a remnant  of  his  followers  to 
the  combat.  Cerialis  at  last  reached  Moguntia- 
cum at  the  head  of  a powerful  army.  Such  was  his  confi- 
dence in  the  numbers  of  his  legionary  force,  that  he  dis- 
missed his  auxiliaries  to  their  own  homes,  a token  of  strength 
which  had  great  moral  effect  far  and  near.  He  then  ascended 
the  valley  of  the  Moselle,  attacked  and  defeated  the  Trevi- 
rans  in  a brilliant  action  at  Rigodulum,  and  captured  Valen- 
tinus. The  colony  of  Galba  opened  its  gates  in  mingled 
hope  and  fear.  The  soldiers,  intent  only  on  plunder,  de- 
manded that  the  city,  the  capital  of  northern  Gaul,  should 
be  abandoned  to  pillage ; and  Cerialis  deserves  credit  for 
firmness  in  disappointing  their  licentious  passions.  This  vic- 
tory completed  the  conversion  of  the  revolted  legionaries, 
all  of  whom  pressed  forward,  penitent  and  humble,  to  salute 
the  triumphant  eagles.  The  Treviri,  the  Remi,  the  Lingones, 


Petilius  Ceria- 
lis enters 
Treves,  and  re- 
ceives the  sub- 
mission of  the 
revolted  le- 
gionaries. 


1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  VO 


406 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  60. 


all  the  nations  in  the  rear  of  the  Roman  camps,  had  now 
returned  to  their  allegiance.  Cerialis  condescended  to  reason 
with  them  on  their  folly  in  murmuring  against  the  prudent 
and  paternal  government  of  which  he  was  the  minister.  He 
reminded  them  not  only  that  the  career  of  military  honours 
was  open  to  them,  in  common  with  the  citizens  of  Rome 
itself,  but  that  the  tribute  they  must  pay  to  Rome  was  not 
heavier  than  would  be  required  to  maintain  their  own  inde- 
pendence ; that  under  a good  emperor,  they  would  enjoy  all 
the  benefits  of  his  wisdom  and  moderation,  while  under  a 
bad  one,  as  bad  there  must  sometimes  be,  just  as  there  must 
sometimes  be  droughts  and  famines  in  the  natural  world, 
they  at  least,  as  the  furthest  removed  from  Rome,  would 
suffer  last  and  lightest.1  It  had  been  better  perhaps  to  have 
referred  them  to  their  own  past  history,  and  convinced  them 
that  freedom  had  hitherto  brought  them  no  blessing,  had 
procured  them  neither  greatness  of  mind  nor  material  civili- 
zation ; that  under  the  sway  of  their  priests  and  nobles,  they 
had  acquired  the  vices  of  the  most  corrupt,  and  retained  the 
barbarity  of  the  rudest  state  of  society.  Children  cannot 
govern  themselves,  and  the  Gauls  had  shown  themselves  as 
incapable  of  self-government  as  children.2 

Civilis  and  Classicus,  now  acting  together  in  the  crisis  of 
their  peril,  resorted  to  artifice,  and  tried  to  damp  the  ardour 

of  Cerialis  by  representing  that  Vespasian,  ac- 

Operationsin  ...  ° J 

the  country  of  cording  to  their  private  accounts,  was  dead ; that 

the  Treviri.  ° 1 ...  7 7 

Mucianus  and  Domitian,  without  the  substance 
of  his  authority,  were  mere  shadows ; that  an  opportunity 

1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  *74. : “ Quomodo  sterilitatem  aut  nimios  imbres  et  caetera 
naturae  mala,  ita  luxum  vel  avaritiam  dominantium  tolerate.” 

2 In  the  fine  speech  here  given  to  Cerialis,  Tacitus  is,  in  fact,  accounting  to 
his  own  conscience  for  the  selfish  tyranny  of  his  countrymen.  “ Nam  pulsis, 
quod  Di  prohibeant,  Romanis,  quid  aliud  quam  bella  omnium  inter  se  gentium 
existent  ? Octingentorum  annorum  fortuna  disciplinaque  compages  haec  coa- 
luit,  quae  convelli  sine  exitio  convellentium  non  potest.”  We  must  admit  in  the 
case  of  the  Romans,  as  promptly  as  in  our  own,  that  the  supineness  of  the  mass 
of  their  subjects  in  the  prospect  of  throwing  off  the  yoke,  speaks  favourably  for 
its  easiness  and  mildness. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


407 


was  now  offered  him,  as  the  chief  military  power  in  Gaul,  to 
make  himself  supreme  oyer  the  nation : to  this  they  for  their 
parts  would  make  no  opposition,  content  to  he  left  in  pos- 
session of  the  Batavian  and  German  territories,  on  which 
their  own  camps  were  planted.  But  Cerialis  was  not  to  he 
seduced.  He  vouchsafed  no  reply  to  the  rebels,  while  he 
sent  their  envoys  at  once  to  Domitian  as  a pledge  of  his  fidel- 
ity. He  was  now  intent  on  fortifying  the  positions  he  had 
won ; but  he  was  not  strong  enough  to  prevent  the  junction 
of  the  bands  of  Gauls  and  Germans  who  continued  still  to 
flock  to  the  standard  of  the  patriots.  Civilis  would  have 
protracted  the  war  to  await  an  expected  invasion  from  the 
eastern  bank  of  the  Bhine : but  Classicus  and  Tutor  repre- 
sented the  weakness  of  the  Homan  forces  at  this  moment, 
and  the  policy  of  anticipating  the  arrival  of  fresh  succours 
from  Spain  and  Britain.  It  was  determined  to  attack  with- 
out delay  the  Roman  camp,  entrenched  outside  the  walls 
of  Treves,  on  the  further  bank  of  the  Moselle.  The  legions 
were  exposed  to  imminent  danger,  for  they  were  taken  by 
surprise,  and  their  commander  himself,  who  had  carelessly 
passed  the  night  beyond  the  lines,  was  absent  at  the  moment 
of  the  assault.  The  bridge  which  connected  the  city  with 
its  suburb,  and  thence  with  their  camp,  was  burnt  by  the 
assailants.  At  the  same  instant  their  rampart  was  scaled, 
some  squadrons  of  cavalry  were  routed ; and  great  were  the 
havoc  and  disorder,  when  Cerialis  at  last  appeared  amongst 
them,  and,  unarmed  and  uncovered  as  he  was,  by  prayers, 
threats,  and  almost  by  main  force,  stopped  their  flight,  and 
rallied  them  to  the  combat.  Amidst  the  tents  and  baggage 
neither  Roman  nor  German  leaders  could  set  their  forces  in 
array,  and  for  a long  time  the  conflict  was  maintained  pell- 
mell  by  personal  skill  and  courage.  At  last  the  Twenty- 
first  legion  made  itself  room  to  form,  sustained  the  broken 
and  yielding  masses  of  its  comrades,  and  gave  them  time  to 
recover,  when  the  fury  of  the  barbarians  received  a check, 
and  the  historian  declares,  in  an  access  of  unusual  fervour, 
that,  by  the  aid  of  Providence  alone,  the  victors  of  the  morn- 


408 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


ing  were  finally  vanquished.  By  the  promptness  with  which 
he  followed  up  his  success,  pursuing  the  routed  Germans  and 
destroying  their  camp,  Cerialis  retrieved  the  reputation  his 
supineness  had  nearly  forfeited.  The  confederates  were  at- 
tacked in  the  rear  by  the  people  of  Colonia,  who  gave  up  to 
the  Romans  the  wife  and  children  of  Civilis.  The  fugitives 
were  harassed,  and  cut  up  in  all  directions.  Another  danger 
impended  on  their  flank.  The  Fourteenth  legion  was  on  its 
way  from  the  shores  of  Britain.  The  Caninefates  manned 
their  vessels,  and  put  out  to  sea  to  intercept  it ; but  these 
succours  reached  the  land,  and  the  men  had  been  already 
disembarked  and  sent  forward  when  their  transports  were 
attacked,  and  sunk  or  disabled.  Some  successful  skirmishes 
still  kept  up  the  failing  courage  of  the  allies,  but  the  toils 
were  closing  around  them,  and  step  by  step  they  were  driven 
towards  the  island  of  the  Batavians,  the  last  precarious  foot- 
hold of  the  boasted  empire  of  the  Gauls.1 

Once  more,  and  once  only,  on  the  auspicious  field  of 
Yetera,  Civilis  turned  at  bay,  and  drew  forth  all  his  forces 

for  a desperate  encounter.  The  soil  in  his  front 

CiviliB  is  de-  A . 

feated  before  was  marsh v,  and  he  had  thrown  into  it  a copious 

Yetera.  4/7  A 

stream  of  water  from  the  Rhine,  by  driving  a 
mound  obliquely  into  the  channel  of  the  river.  Here,  he 
conceived,  the  greater  strength  and  stature  of  the  Germans, 
and  their  skill  in  swimming,  would  give  them  a notable 
advantage ; and  so  indeed  it  proved,  the  battle  being  long 
contested  with  loss  and  risk  to  the  Romans,  whom  Cerialis 
in  vain  excited  by  appeals  to  the  pride  of  each  legion  in  turn, 
to  the  Fourteenth  as  conquerors  of  Britain,  to  the  Sixth  as 
givers  of  the  empire  to  Galba,  to  the  legions  of  the  Rhine  as 
bulwarks  of  the  Roman  frontier.  Ad  last  the  treachery  of  a 
deserter  disclosed  to  him  a path  in  the  morass  by  which  a 
chosen  band  could  surprise  the  right  flank  of  the  enemy. 
At  the  same  moment  a general  charge  was  made  on  their 
front,  and  the  Germans,  pressed  on  two  sides,  were  driven 


1 Tac.  Hist.  iv.  '77-79. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


409 


headlong  into  the  river  on  their  left.  Had  the  Roman  flotilla 
been  at  hand,  their  whole  force  would  have  been  utterly  de- 
stroyed ; but  the  crisis  was  still  delayed,  heavy  rains  checked 
the  pursuit  of  the  Roman  cavalry,  and,  swimming,  wading, 
or  skulking  from  the  field,  the  routed  hordes  effected  their 
escape.1 

Civilis  had  now  crossed  the  Rhine,  and  thrown  himself 
into  the  territory  of  his  German  allies,  the  Chauci  and  the 
Frisii.  He  abandoned  the  line  of  the  Wahal,  Civilis  crosses 
and  the  defence  of  the  Batavian  island,  and  after  the  Ehine- 
carrying  off  his  corn  and  cattle,  cut  the  dams  with  which 
Drusus  had  confined  the  ancient  channel  of  the  Rhine,  and 
laid  the  country  far  and  wide  under  water.2  Behind  this 
new  frontier  he  still  maintained  an  imposing  force,  swelled 
by  a crowd  of  Treviran  fugitives,  among  whom  were,  it  was 
said,  one  hundred  and  thirteen  of  their  senators.3  The  Ro- 
mans were  threatening  his  position  from  several  points.  He 
divided  his  troops  into  four  detachments,  and  attacked  them 
simultaneously  at  Arenacum,  Batavodurum,  Grinnes  and 
Vada.4  Everywhere  he  was  repulsed ; but  the  Romans  again 
had  no  ships  to  complete  their  victory.  The  Germans,  who 
had  probably  greater  command  of  the  river,  made  a night 
attack  in  boats  on  the  camp  at  N’ovesium ; and  here  once 
more  the  want  of  vigilance  of  Cerialis,  who  was  passing  the 
night  in  an  intrigue  with  a native  woman,  had  nearly  proved 

1 Tac.  Hist.  v.  14-18. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  y.  19. : “ Quin  et  diruit  molem  a Druso  Germanico  factam, 
Rhenumque  prono  alveo  in  Galliam  ruentem,  disjectis  quae  morabantur,  efludit. 
Sic  velut  abacto  amne,  tenuis  alveus  insulam  inter  Germanosque  continentium 
terrarum  speciem  fecerat.”  When  Drusus  opened  the  channel  into  the  lake 
Flevus,  he  nearly  drained  the  old  channel  by  Lugdunum  (alter  Rhein),  thus 
effacing  the  separation  between  the  island  on  the  southern  or  Gaulish  bank  and 
the  German  continent  on  the  northern.  Such  seems  to  be  the  meaning  of  a 
passage  which  has  caused  much  perplexity  to  the  commentators. 

3 By  senators  we  are  to  understand  decurions  of  the  Roman  colony.  Stei- 
ninger,  Gesch.  der  Trevirer , p.  129. 

4 Arenacum  is  supposed,  from  its  name  perhaps,  to  be  Amheim.  If  so,  it 
was  not  on  the  Wahal,  but  on  the  old  Rhine,  and  the  Romans,  we  thus  see, 
had  now  occupied  the  “ Island.”  The  other  places  are  quite  uncertain. 


410 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


fatal  to  the  Romans.1  The  Germans  made  prize  of  the  prae- 
torian galley,  in  which  they  hoped  to  have  captured  the 
general  himself,  and  bore  it  off  as  an  offering  to  their  priest- 
ess Yeleda.  Meanwhile  the  Romans,  who  had 

The  Romans  . 

occnpj^the  occupied  the  Batavian  villages  between  the 
Wahal  and  Rhine,  ostentatiously  spared  the  pri- 
vate estates  of  Civilis,  and  this,  with  the  repeated  failure  of 
his  operations,  threw  suspicion  on  his  earnestness  in  the  cause. 
He  had  boasted  that,  should  the  foe  dare  to  set  foot  within 
the  island,  he  would  instantly  crush  them  ; but  this  vaunt  he 
did  not  attempt  to  execute.  The  allies  had  urged  him  to 
finish  the  war  by  a decisive  engagement;  but  he  had  re- 
strained their  ardour,  and  divided  their  forces.  The  sus- 
picion was  not  without  colour  and  reason.  Civilis  was 
negotiating  with  the  Romans.  To  them  he  set  forth,  it 
seems,  as  merits,  the  very  same  acts  of  perfidy  with  which 
his  countrymen  had  reproached  him.  In  making 

Civilis  treats  ” . r . f3 

with  the  Ro-  terms  for  himself,  he  may  have  stipulated  for  his 

mans.  . A 

people  also ; and  Cerialis  was  fain  to  admit  the 
transparent  pretence  that  they  had  taken  up  arms,  not  against 
the  majesty  of  Rome,  but  for  the  empire  of  Vespasian. 
Civilis  was  allowed  to  rank  himself  among  the  partisans  of 
the  new  government,  with  Mucianus,  Primus,  and  Cerialis 
himself.  The  Germans  of  the  right  bank  were  thus  aban- 
doned by  the  chief  they  had  chosen,  and  the  sullen  acknowl- 
edgment they  made  of  the  superior  fortune  of  the  Romans, 
seems  to  have  been  accepted  as  a submission  by  their  weary 
and  exhausted  conquerors.2  Domitian  and  Mucianus  had  not 
advanced  further  than  Lugdunum  on  the  Rhone,  when  the 
news  of  this  pacification  reached  them,  and  the  young  prince 

1 Tacitus  speaks  of  the  camps  at  Novesium  and  Bonna,  and  does  not  specify 
on  which  the  attack  was  made.  I should  have  supposed  he  meant  Bonna, 
from  the  mention  of  the  general’s  paramour,  Claudia  Sacrata,  as  an  Ubian : 
but  the  German  boats,  he  says,  descended  the  river,  which  can  hardly  be  recon- 
ciled with  a locality  so  high  up  the  stream. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  v.  23-26. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


411 


could  return  to  Rome  with  his  share  of  laurels,  to  greet  his 
brother’s  triumphal  entry  from  Palestine.1 

The  narrative  of  Tacitus,  such  as  it  has  descended  to  us, 
breaks  off  in  the  middle  of  the  speech  with  which  Civilis  is 
supposed  to  plead  his  cause  with  the  Romans. 

1 a J-  TnA  TlftTrF9jtlVO 

Ro  monument  of  antiquity  remains  to  inform  us  of  Tacitus  in- 
of  the  Batavian’s  further  career,  or  what  faith 
was  kept  with  a foe  who  had  proved  himself  more  dangerous 
to  Rome  than  Caractacus  or  Arminius.  They  had  defended 
their  own  country  against  the  invader ; but  Civilis  had  in- 
vaded the  empire,  and  almost  succeeded  in  wresting  from  it 
the  most  precious  of  its  provinces,  the  nursery  of  its  amplest 
resources  and  its  bravest  auxiliaries.  The  account  our  his- 
torian has  given  us  of  this  memorable  mutiny — for  it  is  as  a 
military,  not  a national  revolt  that  we  must  evidently  regard 
it — seems  on  the  whole,  one  of  the  least  successful  episodes 
in  his  history ; it  leaves  but  an  indistinct  impression  of  the 
strength  of  the  opposing  forces,  of  the  localities,  and  even 
the  incidents  of  which  it  treats ; but  it  fails  still  more  re- 
markably in  representing  to  us  the  character  of  the  chief 
actor  in  the  scene.  Civilis,  prominent  as  he  was  for  a 
moment  on  the  world’s  stage,  prominent  as  he  must  always 
be  on  the  page  of  history,  remains  to  us  a name  only.  He 
stands  before  us  without  national  or  personal  The  end  of  Ci- 
characteristics,  without  even  the  mythical  halo  vilis  unknown- 
which  surrounds  the  figure  of  Arminius ; and  we  part  from 
him  at  last  quite  content  to  be  ignorant  of  what  finally  be- 
came of  him,  or  whether  he  was  really  a traitor,  or  only 
unfortunate.  Ror  do  we  learn,  nor  do  we  care  to  inquire, 
what  became  of  his  still  more  shadowy  associates,  Classicus 
and  Tutor ; whether  they  were  included  in  their  chief’s  capit- 

1 According  to  Suetonius,  Domitian’s  object  in  making  his  expedition  into 
Gaul  was  to  rival  the  exploits  of  Titus.  It  was  popularly  rumoured  that  he 
tampered  with  Cerialis  to  get  himself  proclaimed  emperor  by  the  army.  His 
successes,  such  as  they  were,  gained  him  at  least  the  compliment  of  a spirited 
address  in  the  poem  of  Silius  Italicus  (iii.  608.) : 

“ Jam  puer  auricomo  prseformidate  Batavo.” 


412 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  70. 


illation,  or  suffered  in  the  proscription  which  surely  followed, 
however  slight  are  its  traces,  of  the  leaders  in  the  crushed 
sedition.  Upon  one  only  of  the  names  mentioned  in  this 
narrative  a ray  of  interest  has  alighted,  from  an  anecdote 
preserved  by  Dion,  and  related  with  greater  pathos  by 
Pathetic  story  Plutarch.  Julius  Sabinus,  it  has  been  said,  con- 
of  Sabinus.  cealed  himself  after  his  defeat.  He  caused  a 
trusty  slave  to  fire  his  house,  and  gave  out  that  he  had  per- 
ished in  the  flames.  The  story  obtained  credit,  and  search 
ceased  to  be  made  for  him,  while  he  concealed  himself  in  a 
cave  in  a deep  forest.  To  his  faithful  spouse,  Eponina,  he 
contrived  to  communicate  the  secret.  She  joined  him  in  his 
retreat,  and  continued  there  to  live  with  him  for  the  space 
of  nine  years,  interrupted  only  by  her  journeys,  even  as  far 
as  Rome,  to  consult  with  his  friends,  and  learn  if  it  might  be 
possible  to  procure  his  pardon.  In  that  hiding-place  she 
bore  her  husband  two  sons,  and  at  last  the  whole  party 
ventured  to  present  themselves  together  to  the  emperor. 
Eponina  told  the  affecting  story  of  her  conjugal  devotion, 
and  showing  the  pledges  of  her  love,  declared  that  she  had 
endured  to  bear  them  in  the  misery  and  darkness,  that  the 
suppliants  for  mercy  might  be  the  more  in  number.  But 
Vespasian,  it  is  said,  was  utterly  unmoved.  He  pitilessly 
commanded  the  execution  of  both  husband  and  wife.  Epo- 
nina exclaimed  that  it  was  a happier  lot  to  die  than  to  live 
in  the  guilty  enjoyment  of  his  blood-stained  sovereignty.1 

/Such,  says  an  eloquent  Frenchman,  was  the  last  blood  shed 
for  the  cause  of  ancient  Gaul,  the  last  act  of  devotion  to  a 
social  order,  a government,  a religion , the  return  of  which 

1 Dion,  lxvi.  3. ; Plutarch,  Amator.  p.  770.  It  may  be  some  relief  to  the 
reader  to  know  that  this  story,  one  of  the  most  pathetic  in  Roman  annals,  seems 
liable  to  great  suspicion.  Dion  intimates  that  both  the  husband  and  wife  were 
sacrificed.  Plutarch  speaks  only  of  Eponina.  There  could  be  no  motive  for 
such  barbarity  towards  the  contemptible  Sabinus,  except  as  a pretender  to  the 
blood  of  the  Julii.  This  feeling  would  have  been  as  strong  against  the  children 
as  their  father ; but  according  to  Plutarch,  the  son  certainly  survived,  and  he 
had  himself  seen  one  of  them  at  Delphi,  filling  probably  the  official  dignity  of 
the  priesthood.  Yet  it  is  hardly  worth  while  to  pluck  the  story  of  the  individ- 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


413 


was  neither  possible  nor  desirable.1  The  narrative  now  con- 
cluded sufficiently  shows  that  national  spirit  had  already  be- 
come extinct  among  the  Gaulish  people.  It  was  not  from 
their  own  forests,  or  stockades,  still  less  from  their  cities,  that 
the  last  heroes  of  resistance  to  Home  had  sprung.  Civilis 
and  Tutor,  Classicus  and  Sabinus,  were  all  officers  attached 
to  the  Roman  armies ; they  had  learned  the  art  of  war  under 
Roman  training,  and  their  ideas  of  national  government  were 
only  a faint  reflex  of  the  Roman.  Their  aim  at  self-aggran- 
dizement was  hardly  in  any  case  disguised ; yet  the  imperfect 
sympathies  of  their  countrymen  were  in  no  wise  shocked  by 
it.  We  trace  in  their  attempt  no  germ  of  a self-evolving 
and  self-sustaining  power.  The  two  great  elements  of  Gaul- 
ish nationality,  the  nobility  and  the  priesthood,  had  been  ab- 
sorbed by  the  spirit  of  assimilation  to  Rome.  The  nobles 
were  content  to  be  centurions  and  tribunes : the  Druids  re- 
joiced in  the  pensions  and  titles  of  Augurs  and  Flamens.2 
We  shall  hear  no  more  of  either  the  one  or  the  other.  Occa- 
sions will  occur  when  Gaul  will  again  play  a great  part  in 
Roman  history ; but  it  will  be  only  the  Gaul  of  the  camp. 
The  empire  of  Rome  will  be  won  and  lost  by  Gaulish  hands ; 
but  they  will  be  the  hands  of  trained  auxiliaries,  with  all  the 

ual  from  the  mass  of  suffering  which  the  historian  of  these  times  must  record, 
and,  with  Lucan  at  Pharsalia,  I often  mutter,  amidst  the  horrors  I have  under- 
taken to  relate, 

“ Mors  nulla  querela 

Digna  sua  est ; nullosquehominum  lugere  vacamus.  . . . 

Per  populos  hie  Roma  perit.” 

1 Thierry,  Gaulois , iii.  in  fin. 

2 Thierry  refers  to  the  notices  of  the  professors  at  Burdigala  by  Ausonius 
(iv.  x.).  In  the  fourth  century  the  Gaulish  priests  of  Apollo  remembered  with- 
out remorse  that  they  were  descended  from  the  priests  of  Belenus.  The  num- 
ber of  Gauls  we  find  with  sacerdotal  names  deserves  remark.  Thus  we  have 
Julius  Sacrovir,  Julius  Auspex,  Claudia  Sacrata.  It  seems  probable  that  these 
appellations  indicated  the  Druidical  functions  or  descent  of  their  bearers.  Other 
cognomens,  such  as  Civilis,  Tutor,  and  Classicus,  seem  to  be  Gaulish  appella- 
tions Latinized ; at  least  we  shall  hardly  meet  with  them  among  the  genuine 
Romans. 


414 


HISTORY  OR  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  70. 


feelings,  and  even  with  the  title  of  Romans.  We  have  trac- 
ed in  this  history  the  fall  of  Gallic  independence  between  the 
eras  of  Caesar  and  Vespasian  : we  have  seen  a great  people 
conquered  and  extinguished.  We  now  turn  to  another  pic- 
ture, that  of  the  fall  of  Jewish  independence,  protracted 
through  the  same  period  : we  shall  see  there  also  a great  na- 
tion conquered  and  crushed;  but  the  Jews,  at  least,  have 
never  suffered  extinction. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


415 


CHAPTER  LIX. 

MATURITY  OF  THE  JEWISH  NATION : ITS  MATERIAL  PROSPERITY : DISCONTENT  WITH 
ITS  POSITION. — RESISTANCE  OF  BRIGANDS  OR  FALSE  CHRISTS. — TUMULTS  IN 

JERUSALEM  CONTROLLED  BY  THE  SANHEDRIM. INSURRECTION  IN  GALILEE 

QUELLED  (A.  D.  52). — FELIX,  GOVERNOR  OF  JUDEA. — AGRIPPA  A SPY  ON  THE 
JEWS. — INSURRECTION  AND  DEFEAT  OF  CESTIUS  GALLUS  (a.  D.  66). — VESPA- 
SIAN TAKES  THE  COMMAND. — JEWISH  FACTIONS : THE  MODERATES  AND  THE 
ZEALOTS. — JOSEPHUS  THE  HISTORIAN  COMMANDS  IN  GALILEE. — HIS  DEFENCE 

OF  JOTAPATA  (a.  D.  67). HE  IS  TAKEN,  AND  ATTACHES  HIMSELF  TO  THE 

ROMANS. — REDUCTION  OF  GALILEE. SECOND  CAMPAIGN  (a.  D.  68). REDUCTION 

OF  PERAEA. — SUSPENSION  OF  HOSTILITIES  (a.  D.  69). — ACCOUNT  OF  THE  JEWS 
BY  TACITUS:  HIS  ILLIBERAL  DISPARAGEMENT  OF  THEM. REVOLUTION  IN  JE- 
RUSALEM.  OVERTHROW  OF  THE  MODERATE  PARTY. THE  THREE  CHIEFS  OF  THE 

ZEALOTS,  JOHN,  SIMON,  AND  ELEAZAR,  AND  STRIFE  BETWEEN  THEM. TOPOG- 

RAPHY OF  JERUSALEM. — TITUS  COMMENCES  THE  SIEGE  (a.  D.  70). — THE  FIRST 

WALL  STORMED. ROMAN  CIRCUMVALLATION. FAMINE  AND  PORTENTS — ESCAPE 

OF  THE  CHRISTIANS. — CAPTURE  OF  THE  CITADEL. — STORMING  OF  THE  TEMPLE. 

BURNING  OF  THE  HOLY  OF  HOLIES. FEEBLE  DEFENCE  OF  THE  UPPER  CITY. 

— DESTRUCTION  OF  JERUSALEM. — CAPTURE  OF  THE  JEWISH  CHIEFS. — FINAL 
REDUCTION  OF  JUDEA. — MASSACRES  AND  CONFISCATIONS. — TITUS  RETURNS  TO 
ROME. — TRIUMPH  OVER  JUDEA. — THE  ARCH  OF  TITUS  (a.  D.  44-70.  A.  U.  797- 
823). 

IX  commencing  a chapter  which  will  be  devoted  to  the 
great  insurrection  of  the  Jews,  ending  in  the  destruction 
of  their  city  and  final  subversion  of  their  polity, 

...  , J 1 . Y The  Jewish  na- 

it  will  be  well  to  remark  the  distinction  which  tion  in  the  first 
existed  between  this  people  at  the  period  we  are  matSy^of  its 
considering,  and  all  the  other  subjects  of  Rome.  powers‘ 

The  victorious  republic  had  never  yet,  throughout  the  long 
career  of  its  conquests,  confronted  a people  in  full  strength 
and  maturity.  The  Carthaginians,  the  Greeks,  the  Egyp- 
tians, and  lastly  the  Gauls,  had  all  passed  their  prime  before 
the  shock  came,  which  broke  them  against  the  vigorous  ado- 


416 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


lescence  of  the  republic.  But  such  was  not  the  case  with 
the  J ews.  After  all  the  losses  and  disasters  inflicted  on  its 
political  weakness,  that  extraordinary  people  was  still  grow- 
ing in  numbers,  still  advancing  in  moral  influence.  The  nar- 
row sphere  of  its  natural  frontiers,  and  the  pressure  of  mighty 
empires  on  every  side,  had  checked  indeed  its  territorial  ex- 
tension. From  David  to  Herod  the  bounds  of  Jewish  occu- 
pation were  still  confined  to  the  peninsula  of  Palestine ; but 
the  authority  of  Jewish  ideas  had  made  ample  conquests 
beyond  the  ocean  and  the  desert.1  Outside  the  limits  of  Pal- 
estine the  Jews,  scattered  in  every  city  of  the  three  conti- 
nents, were  not  existing  merely  on  sufferance.  Strong  in 
numbers,  strong  in  national  prejudices,  stronger  still  in  the 
force  of  their  national  character,  they  assumed  everywhere 
an  attitude  more  or  less  aggressive ; not  thrusting  themselves 
indeed  into  political  station,  not  coveting  a share  of  the  gov- 
ernment, as  long  as  they  were  suffered  to  manage  their  own 
affairs  after  their  own  fashion,  but, — stranger,  as  it  seemed, 
and  more  irritating, — seeking  by  all  means  to  sway  the 
minds  of  those  about  them,  to  wean  them  from  their  local 
prejudices,  and  inoculate  them  with  a moral  principle  foreign 
to  their  own.  Urged,  apparently,  in  this  unwonted  career 
of  proselytism  by  a blind  instinct,  they  subjected  themselves 
in  every  quarter  to  jealousy,  and  sometimes  to  persecution, 
such  as  had  hitherto  been  almost  unknown  among  heathen 
societies:  but  violence  they  had  generally  retaliated  with 
equal  vigour,  till  they  had  acquired  in  every  city,  from  the 
Euphrates  to  the  Nile  and  Tiber,  a character,  not  perhaps 
wholly  merited,  for  turbulence  and  seditiousness. 

The  advance  of  the  Jewish  people  in  material  resources, 
within  the  limits  of  their  proper  country,  was  not  less 
its  material  strongly  marked  at  this  epoch.  The  impetus 

prosperity.  given  by  the  Koman  conquests  to  eastern  com- 

1 David  and  Solomon  (century  xi.  before  Christ)  had  exacted  tribute  from 
various  tribes  as  far  as  the  Euphrates  and  the  Red  Sea  (see  2 Sam.  viii.,  1 
Kings , iv.) ; but  this  was  the  exercise  of  a transient  authority,  and  implies  no 
extension  of  national  inhabitancy. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


417 


merce  must  have  been  keenly  felt  at  the  spot  to  which  the 
traffic  of  Egypt,  Syria,  and  Arabia,  converged.  The  growth 
of  a New  City  outside  the  walls  of  Jerusalem,  the  creation 
of  traders  and  manufacturers,  indicates  a great  industrial 
movement,  and  the  magnificent  constructions  with  which  the 
elder  Herod  adorned  the  chief  places  of  his  dominions,  not 
increasing,  but,  on  the  contrary,  remitting  at  the  same  time, 
the  burdens  of  his  people,  proves  the  fact  still  more  deci- 
sively. Military  training,  no  doubt,  was  checked  among  the 
Jews  by  the  policy  of  the  empire ; but  their  youth  were  ex- 
empted, by  special  favour,  from  the  ordinary  waste  of  the 
conscription,  and  devoted  without  reserve  to  the  labours  of 
agriculture  or  commerce.  The  national  heart  beat  as  warmly 
and  truly  as  ever.  The  old  traditions  were  held  in  rever- 
ence ; the  Temple  and  its  services  frequented  with  all  the 
ancient  fervour ; and  in  the  direction  now  taken  by  its  relig- 
ious aspirations  we  discover  a proof  of  the  material  prosper- 
ity of  the  nation.  Worldly  state  was  the  invisible  idol  of 
the  vacant  fane  of  Jerusalem.  The  worship  of  wealth,  gran- 
deur, and  dominion,  blinded  the  Jews  to  the  form  of  spirit- 
ual godliness ; the  rejection  of  the  Saviour  and  the  deifica- 
tion of  Herod  were  parallel  manifestations  of  the  same  en- 
grossing delusion. 

The  national  pride,  thus  fostered  by  outward  circum- 
stances, in  which  all  classes  were  involved,  was  not  incom- 
patible with  an  antique  simplicity  of  manners 

* -*■  j.  •/  ftutic^n© 

which  bound  them  together,  and  gave  a healthy  simplicity  of 
vitality  to  the  body  politic.  The  tone  of  inter- 
course between  the  various  ranks  among  the  Jews,  even  in 
the  days  of  which  the  New  Testament  treats,  still  savours 
strongly  of  the  patriarchal ; their  methods  of  national  gov- 
ernment, so  far  as  it  was  free  to  act,  were  paternal ; more 
dependence  was  placed  by  their  rulers  on  popular  patriotism 
and  affection  than  on  strict  arrangements  of  finance  or  of 
police ; the  social  relations  seem  to  have  been  unusually  pure, 
those,  above  all,  of  master  and  servant  were  natural  and 
kindly;  slavery  among  the  Jews  was  so  confined  in  its  ex- 
VOL.  VI. — 27 


418 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


tent  and  so  mild  in  practice,  so  guarded  by  law  and  custom, 
as  to  become  a real  source  of  strength  instead  of  weakness 
to  the  commonwealth.  The  mutual  interest  which  thus 
bound  all  classes  together  became  a fulcrum  for  government, 
and  when  at  last  the  nation  rushed  to  arms,  doubled  the 
strength  of  its  battalions.1  The  great  rising  of  the  Jews 
against  the  Romans,  which  is  now  to  be  related,  was,  beyond 
any  other  in  ancient  history,  since  the  resistance  at  least  of 
Greece  to  Xerxes,  a common  devotion  to  a common  cause. 
The  contest  was  that  of  a whole  people  (not  indeed  of  all  its 
members,  but  at  least  of  every  rank  and  every  order)  against 
a limited  number  of  trained  soldiers.  The  lesson,  painful 
and  humiliating,  which  it  teaches  us,  stands  alone  perhaps  in 
ancient,  but  has  been  repeated  only  too  often  in  modern  an- 
nals, that  a nation  in  arms  wages  an  unequal  contest  with 
skilful  generals,  disciplined  legions,  and  abundant  military 
resources. 

Whatever  were  the  causes  which  bound  the  Jews  so 
closely  together,  and  gave  them  such  confidence  in  one 
Attitude  of  the  another,  such  disregard  for  the  rights  and  usages 
West  mid  in  °f  the  foreigner,  it  is  important  to  observe  that 
the  East  their  spirit  of  self-assertion  was  not  less  manifest 
abroad  than  at  home.  We  have  seen  what  disturbances 
marked  their  sojourn  in  Alexandria;  we  have  noticed  the 
devices  of  expulsion  which  a mild  and  favourable  ruler  was 
induced  to  launch  against  them  at  Rome.  Throughout  the 
Western  Empire  they  were  at  least  controlled  with  vigour; 


1 Passages  in  the  New  Testament  will  occur  to  every  reader  to  show  how 
much  the  Jewish  finance  depended  on  voluntary  contributions ; how  large  a 
part  the  people  themselves  took  in  the  administration  and  execution  of  their 
laws ; how  generally  the  menial  was  the  “ hired  servant,”  not  the  slave  of  his 
master.  This  view  of  Jewish  manners  is  fully  borne  out  by  Josephus.  In  the 
medley  of  classes  which  jostle  together  in  his  account  of  the  insurrection,  slaves 
have  no  place  whatever.  I am  not  sure  that  the  term  is  so  much  as  once  men- 
tioned in  it.  If  I have  not  specifically  alluded  to  the  Mosaic  arrangements  for 
the  periodical  restitution  of  lands,  and  the  cancelling  of  debts  by  personal  ser- 
vice, which  checked  an  undue  accumulation  of  property,  it  is  because  we  know 
not  how  far  the  Levitical  law  was  actually  in  force  at  this  period. 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


419 


but  in  the  East  they  defied  the  irregular  police  of  the  Par- 
thians,  made  open  war  against  the  satraps  of  Babylonia, 
united  themselves  with  the  Syrians  against  the  Greeks  in 
those  regions,  and,  a bolder  and  fiercer  race  than  either,  se- 
cured the  victory  to  the  party  they  espoused;  until  both 
Syrians  and  Greeks  combined  against  them,  and  routed  them 
with  repeated  slaughter.  The  Parthians,  it  seems,  looked  on 
in  terror  while  these  strangers,  provoking  or  provoked,  inun- 
dated their  streets  with  blood.  The  Jews,  worsted  in  the 
contest,  seized  on  the  cities  of  Nearda  and  Nisibis,  and  there 
continued  to  maintain  themselves  in  half-acknowledged  inde- 
pendence.1 * 

The  experience  of  Alexandria  and  Seleucia  was  not  lost 
on  the  Roman  government.  The  mildness  with  which  the 
emperors,  following  the  policy  of  Julius  Caesar,  Annexation  of 
had  generally  treated  the  Jewish  people,  had  not  Eomanempire. 
secured  them  against  disturbances  within  the  a.  d.  44. 
frontiers  of  Palestine,  against  the  jealousy  of  its  ^ 79T- 
parties  or  the  covert  attempts  of  its  princes  to  arm  them- 
selves in  anticipation  of  a revolt.  Agrippa  was  not  allowed 
to  complete  the  defences  with  which  he  had  begun  to  encir- 
cle the  most  exposed  front  of  Jerusalem.3 * * * *  This  monarch 
left  at  his  death  four  children.  The  eldest,  a son,  who  bore 
his  father’s  name,  was  at  the  time  detained  at  Rome,  and 
had  completed  his  seventeenth  year.  The  others  were 
daughters : Berenice,  aged  sixteen,  was  already  married  to 
her  uncle  Herodes,  king  of  the  little  territory  of  Chalcis ; 
Mariamne  was  some  years  younger,  and  Drusilla  a mere  in- 
fant.8 Claudius,  ever  attached  to  the  traditions  of  his  pre- 
decessors, would  have  sent  the  young  Agrippa  to  assume  his 

1 Joseph.  Antiq.  Jud.  xviii.  10.  These  events  occurred  in  the  reign  of 

Caligula. 

3 Joseph.  Antiq.  xix.  7.  2.  Comp.  Bell.  Jud.  v.  4.  2.,  and  Tac.  Hist.  v.  12. 

3 Berenice,  according  to  the  positive  assertion  of  Josephus  (Antiq.  xix.  9.)^ 

was  sixteen  at  the  time  of  her  father’s  death,  a.  u.  797.  At  a later  period  we 

shall  remember  this  date  with  some  surprise,  and  may  be  tempted  to  suspect 

the  historian  of  an  error. 


420 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  44. 


father’s  diadem ; but  be  was  dissuaded  by  bis  ministers,  pre- 
tending that  a prince  so  young  should  not  be  trusted  with 
power,  but  influenced  more  probably  by  the  pressure  of  their 
friends’  solicitations  to  surrender  this  wealthy  province  to 
the  cohort  of  a Roman  governor.1  Judea  and  Samaria  were 
now  placed  by  decree  of  the  senate  in  dependence  on  the 
proconsulate  of  Syria,  and  Cuspius  Fadus  was  the  first  offi- 
cer appointed  to  govern  them,  with  the  title  of  Caesar’s  pro- 
curator. But  the  family  of  Agrippa,  thus  summarily  disin- 
herited, were  treated  with  outward  respect;  the  first  duty 
enjoined  on  Fadus  was  to  chastise  the  people  of  Caesarea  and 
Sebaste,  for  the  insults  they  had  vented  against  the  memory 
of  their  late  sovereign. 

Immediately  a swarm  of  Roman  officials  alighted  on  the 
fair  fields  of  the  long-promised  land.  The  freedmen  and 

favourites  of  the  court  reaped  the  first  fruits  of 

T^esistancG  oi 

the  brigands  or  the  anticipated  harvest.  The  public  revenues 

false  Christs.  _ . . , 

ol  the  country  were  assigned  to  the  imperial 
fiscus,  and  thus  the  interests  of  the  emperor  himself  were 
identified  with  those  of  his  agents  and  commissioners.  The 
yoke  of  Caesar  might  not  be  heavier  than  that  of  Herod ; but 
it  pressed  in  a new  place ; the  burden,  harshly  shifted,  was 
felt  to  be  more  galling.  The  priests  and  nobles  murmured, 
intrigued,  conspired ; the  rabble,  bolder  or  more  impatient, 
broke  out  into  sedition,  and  followed  every  chief  who  offered 
to  lead  them  to  victory  and  independence.  Theudas  and 
Tholomeus,  with  many  others, — brigands  as  they  were  styled 
by  the  Romans,  Christs,  elected  and  anointed  by  Jehovah, 
as  they  boldly  proclaimed  themselves,  pointing  to  the  Law 
and  the  Prophets  of  their  sacred  books  as  their  title  to  divine 
support, — were  routed  in  the  field,  or  hunted  through  the 
wilderness,  till  one  after  another  they  were  taken  and  slain.2 

1 Tac.  Hist.  y.  9. : “ Claudius,  defunctis  regibus  aut  ad  modicum  redactis, 
Judaeam  provinciam  equitibus  Romanis  aut  libertis  permisit.” 

2 For  Theudas  and  Tholomeus,  see  Joseph.  Antiq.  xx.  1.  4.  For  the 
“ Egyptian,”  Acts,  xxi.  38. ; Joseph.  Antiq.  xx.  6.  6.  The  term  pseudo-Christ 
is  applied  to  these  pretenders  in  Matt.  xxix.  4.,  and  thence  adopted  by  the 


A.U.  797.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


421 


Fadus  was  succeeded  by  Tiberius  Alexander,  against  whom 
as  a renegade  from  the  national  faith  the  Jews  were  the 
more  embittered.  Yet  his  defection  was  more  than  counter- 
balanced by  the  conversion  to  Judaism  of  Helena,  queen  of 
Adiabene,  and  her  son  Izates,  whose  territory,  lying  between 
Palestine  and  Parthia,  might  form  a convenient  link  in  the 
chain  now  secretly  forging,  to  bind  in  strict  alliance  together 
the  greatest  rivals  of  Rome  and  the  most  reluctant  of  her 
subjects.  The  government  of  Tiberius  was  signalized  by 
the  capture  and  execution  of  Jacobus  and  Simon,  sons  of 
Judas  the  Galilean ; but  under  Cumanus,  who  followed  him, 
the  populace  of  Jerusalem  itself  rose  in  frenzy  against  their 
masters,  and  the  Roman  soldiers  were  let  loose  with  drawn 
swords  upon  them,  in  the  midst  of  the  holy  season  of  Pass- 
over.1  It  was  only  indeed  under  extraordinary 

J J Tumults  in 

provocation  that  the  populace  of  the  Jewish  Jerusalem  con- 

■r.  1 *1  trolled  by  the 

capital,  who  were  generally  controlled  by  the  prndence  of  the 
superior  prudence  oi  their  chiefs,  broke  into 
violence  in  the  streets.  In  the  Sanhedrim  were  many  de- 
voted adherents  of  Rome,  and  the  rest  were  well  aware  of 
the  weakness  of  the  national  power.  All  agreed  in  the  senti- 
ment of  Caiaphas  the  high  priest,  when  the  multitude  seemed 
ready  for  a moment  to  accept  Jesus  as  the  Christ:  If  we 
let  him  alone  all  men  will  believe  on  him , and  the  Romans 
will  come  and  taJce  away  both  our  place  and  nation.  . . It 
is  expedient  for  us  that  one  man  should  die  for  the  people , 
and  that  the  whole  nation  perish  not?  But  the  ruder  inde- 
pendence of  the  Galileans  was  not  so  easily  kept  in  check. 
Their  tract  of  heath  and  mountain  was  always  then,  as  it  has 

Fathers  of  the  Church.  Josephus  calls  them  Ir/ara'i,  apxt-ATjoTai,  ydrjTeg,  cnrare- 
uvee,  and  “ false  prophets,”  but  never  'ipevddxpioTot.  He  makes  no  more  allu- 
sion to  the  false  Christs  than  to  the  true  Christ.  The  subject  of  the  Messiah 
was  one  he  shrank  from  contemplating  in  any  shape.  This  may  account  for 
his  silence  about  the  persecution  of  the  “ Christians  ” by  Nero  at  Rome,  even 
supposing  these  to  have  included  the  turbulent  Christ-seeking  Jews. 

1 Joseph.  Antiq.  xx.  3.  4.  The  date  is  not  precisely  fixed,  but  may  be 
A.  d.  50  (a.  u.  803). 

2 St.  John’s  Gospel , xi.  48. ; Salvador,  Pom.  Bom.  i.  493. 


422 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  52. 


since  always  been,  in  a state  of  partial  insurrection.  The 
Roman  authorities  were  constantly  engaged  in  hunting  down 
the  banditti,  who  assumed  the  title  of  patriots,  and  gladly 
employed  against  them  the  local  rivalry  which  nourished 
perpetual  feud  between  the  tribes  of  Galilee  and  Samaria.  It 
was  necessary  for  the  inhabitants  of  the  northern  region  to 
traverse  Samaria  on  their  periodical  pilgrimages  to  Jerusalem. 
On  such  occasions  they  seldom  escaped  without  insult,  if 
not  actual  injury.  The  armed  bands  of  Galilee  would  some- 
times, in  revenge,  descend  on  the  homesteads  of  Samaria, 
and  harry  the  lands  of  men  whom  they  accused  of  too  great 
subservience  to  the  foreigner.  The  Romans  interfered, 
insurrection  in  Cumanus  placed  himself  at  the  head  of  four  co- 
byQuatotused  borts  with  a force  of  Samaritan  militia,  attacked 
a.  d.  52.  Eleazar,  the  Galilean  chief,  routed  and  put  his  fol- 
a.  ir.  805.  lowers  to  the  sword.  Again  the  Galileans  rose 
with  redoubled  fury  ; the  chiefs  of  Jerusalem  in  vain  implored 
them  to  submit  to  inevitable  fate.  The  Roman  battalions  were 
not  always  successful  in  their  attacks  on  these  desperate  men. 
The  war  would  have  spread  from  canton  to  canton,  and  set 
the  province  in  a flame,  had  not  Quadratus,  the  prefect  of 
Syria,  interposed  with  the  mass  of  his  forces,  trampled  down 
all  resistance  with  ferocious  energy,  and  extinguished  the 
quarrel  of  the  provincial  factions  in  the  blood  of  a multitude 
of  captives.  The  governor  ascribed  the  disturbance  to  the 
rivalry  of  the  Roman  procurators.  Cumanus  presided  in 
Galilee  ; Felix,  the  brother  of  the  favourite  Pallas,  seems  to 
have  held  independent  authority  in  Samaria.  Claudius, 
appealed  to  for  instructions,  left  the  decision  to  Quadratus, 
and  he,  well  aware  of  the  powerful  interest  of  Felix,  allowed 
the  punishment,  which  should  have  been  shared  alike  by 
Felix  governor  both,  to  descend  upon  Cumanus  only.1  The 
whole  territory  of  the  Jewish  people  was  now 


Felix  go 
of  Judej 


1 Tac.  Ann.  xii.  54. ; Joseph.  Antiq.  xx.  5-7  (a.  d.  52,  a.  u.  805).  There 
is  some  discrepancy  in  these  statements,  which  are  not,  perhaps,  irreconcilable. 
Of  the  government  of  Felix  Tacitus  had  said  (Hist  v.  9.) : “ E quibus  Antonius 
Felix  per  omnem  sfevitiam  ac  libidinem  jus  regium  servili  ingenio  exercuit, 
Drusilla  Cleopatra?  et  Antonii  nepte  in  matrimonium  accepta.” 


A.  U.  805.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


423 


united  under  the  sway  of  Felix,  who  continued  to  enjoy  his 
power,  and  accumulate  riches,  for  many  years  after  the  death 
of  his  patron  and  the  disgrace  of  his  brother.1  His  long 
reign  is  marked  by  repeated  mention  of  the  bandits  and  false 
prophets  still  infesting  the  province ; the  zeal  for  independ- 
ence, rash  and  futile  in  its  efforts,  was  still  unabated ; but  in 
general,  from  the  absence  of  public  events  which  distinguishes 
the  epoch,  the  country  seems  to  have  enjoyed  comparative 
tranquillity.  Claudius,  before  his  death,  gave  the  young 
Herod  Agrippa  the  tetrarchy  of  Philip,  consisting  of  some 
districts  beyond  Jordan,  together  with  Trachonitis  and  Ba- 
tanea.  Drusilla  was  married  to  a prince  of  Emesa,  a proselyte 
to  Judaism  ; but  Felix,  becoming  enamoured  of  her,  did  not 
scruple  to  carry  her  off  from  her  husband.  When  he  was  at 
last  recalled,  the  Jews  took  occasion  to  prefer  complaints 
against  him ; but  he  was  still  protected  by  Hero,  and  not- 
withstanding the  wealth  he  was  supposed  to  have  amassed, 
seems  to  have  lived  and  died  in  uninterrupted  prosperity.2 

The  discreet  and  the  timid  still  retained  the  chief  influ- 
ence in  Jerusalem.  The  Romans  had  gained  many  adherents 
in  every  rank,  especially  among  the  priests  and  no-  The  8pirit  of 
bles,  and  divided  the  masses  of  the  people,  while  SroiiedV 
they  kept  from  their  sight  the  young  princes,  ^easSe™/ 
who,  as  their  natural  leaders,  might  have  com-  Corbul°- 
bined  them  together.  But  on  the  frontiers  of  Syria,  at  this 
moment,  the  elements  of  commotion  were  more  rife.  Every 
pulsation  of  national  feeling  in  Parthia  and  Armenia  was 
communicated  through  the  synagogues  on  the  Tigris  and 
Euphrates,  and  from  station  to  station  across  the  desert,  to 

1 Felix  is  supposed  to  have  been  procurator  of  Judea  six  years  under  Nero, 
from  a.  d.  54  to  60.  Such  is  Salvador’s  statement ; but  the  precise  dates  are 
not  indicated  by  the  historians.  Comp.  Act.  Apost.  xxix.  10.  The  Romans,  it 
should  be  observed,  gave  the  official  name  of  Judea  to  the  whole  region  of 
Palestine,  including,  besides,  Judea  proper,  Galilee,  Samaria,  and  Peraea. 

2 Josephus  ( Antiq . Jud.  xx.  7.  8.)  says  that  he  was  protected  by  the  influ- 
ence of  his  brother ; but  Pallas  was  disgraced  as  early  as  56,  though  he  was 
not  put  to  death  by  Nero  till  63.  Felix  had  a son  by  Drusilla,  named  Agrippa. 
Joseph.  Antiq.  Jud.  xx.  6.  2. 


424 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  61. 


the  centres  of  Jewish  life  at  Jerusalem,  Tiberias  and  Caesarea. 
Full  of  scorn  for  the  unwarlike  character  of  Nero,  full  of 
hope  in  the  unappeased  discontent  of  the  Jewish  people,  the 
Parthians  were  now  making  aggressions  on  the  side  of  Ar- 
menia, which  were  in  fact  a blow  to  the  honour  and  there- 
with to  the  influence  of  Rome.  The  imperial  officers  required 
the  tributary  chiefs  on  the  frontier  to  arm  on  their  be- 
half. Corbulo,  the  bravest  of  the  Roman  generals,  was 
placed  at  the  head  of  fresh  forces ; the  disagreements  which 
ensued  between  him  and  Quadratus  ended  in  the  dismissal 
of  the  prefect,  and  the  union  of  the  eastern  provinces  under 
the  best  man  the  empire  could  summon  to  their  defence. 
The  Jews  watched  the  progress  of  military  operations  ; and 
if  dismayed  at  the  defeat  of  the  Parthians,  they  were  re- 
assured by  the  death  of  Corbulo  which  so  speedily  followed. 
But  the  work  of  this  general  of  the  ancient  stamp,  rapid  as 
it  was,  remained  firmly  established.  Corbulo  had  restored  the 
discipline  of  the  legions,  long  demoralized  by  the  negligence 
of  their  chiefs,  and  the  luxury  of  their  Syrian  cantonments. 
He  had  formed  an  army  of  veteran  legions : he  left  the  Third, 
the  Fifth,  the  Tenth,  and  the  Twelfth  in  full  pride  and  vigour, 
to  curb  the  discontent  or  turbulence  which  brooded  over 

hopes  of  insurrection.  And  so  thoroughly  had 

The  ascendency  A ..  i 

of  Rome  in  the  he  quelled  the  spirit  of  the  Parthians,  that,  when 

East  acknowl-  * ^ . 

edged  by  the  three  years  alter  his  death,  the  W est  was  in- 

Pftrth  i an  s * 

volved  in  universal  confusion, — when  the  chiefs 
of  the  legions  were  hastening  from  all  quarters  to  wrestle 
for  the  empire  in  Italy,  when  Gaul  on  one  side,  as  we  have 
seen,  and  Judea,  as  we  are  about  to  see,  on  the  other,  were 
at  once  in  open  revolt, — the  hereditary  foes  of  Rome  still 
kept  their  swords  in  the  scabbard,  and  neither  gave  aid  to 
the  insurgents,  nor  sought  aggrandizement  for  themselves.1 

Felix,  the  procurator  of  Judea,  was  succeeded  in  815  by 
Porcius  Festus,  who  was  carried  off  by  sickness  after  a vig- 

1 This  submission  of  the  Parthians  may  be  partly  ascribed  to  a personal 
admiration  conceived,  as  it  would  seem,  by  Yologesus  for  Nero,  of  which  evi- 
dence has  been  given  already.  See  above,  chap.  lv. 


A.  U.  814.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


425 


orous  government  of  two  years.  Festus  was 

b ^ • i Romans 

followed  by  Albmus,  and  alter  another  interval  employ  Agrip- 
of  two  years,  marked  by  no  occurrence  of  mo-  upon theJews 
ment,  Gessius  Florus  undertook  the  control  of  m Jerusalem- 
the  Jewish  people,  who  were  becoming  daily  more  refrac- 
tory. For  their  coercion  the  Romans  had  invented  a pecu- 
liar machinery.  To  Agrippa,  the  tetrarch,  for  by  this  style 
we  may  best  distinguish  him,  they  had  given  the  title  of  king 
of  the  sacrifices,  in  virtue  of  which  he  was  suffered  to  reside 
in  the  palace  at  Jerusalem,  and  retain  certain  functions,  fit- 
ted to  impose  on  the  imagination  of  the  more  ardent  votaries 
of  Jewish  nationality.  The  palace  of  the  Herods  overlooked 
the  Temple,  and  from  its  upper  rooms  the  king  could  observe 
all  that  passed  in  that  mart  of  business  and  intrigue.  Placed, 
however,  as  a spy  in  this  watch-tower,  he  was  regarded  by 
the  Zealots,  the  faction  of  independence,  as  a foe  to  be  baf- 
fled rather  than  a chief  to  be  respected  and  honoured.  They 
raised  the  walls  of  their  sanctuary  to  shut  out  his  view,  and 
this,  among  other  causes  of  discontent  between  the  factions 
in  the  city,  ripened  to  an  enmity  which  presaged  the  expul- 
sion of  the  king  with  all  the  friends  of  Rome  about  him,  at 
the  first  outbreak  of  the  now  inevitable  insurrection.1 

And  now  was  introduced  into  the  divisions  of  this  un- 
happy people  a new  feature  of  atrocity.  The  Zealots  sought 
to  terrify  the  more  prudent  or  time-serving  by  The  gicarii  or 
an  organized  system  of  private  assassination,  secret  assassins. 
Their  Sicarii , or  men  of  the  dagger,  are  recognised  in  the 
records  of  the  times  as  a secret  agency,  by  which  the  most 
impatient  of  the  patriots  calculated  on  exterminating  the 
chief  supporters  of  the  foreign  government.  The  conspira- 
tors met  under  oath  in  secret,  and  chose  the  victims  who 
should  in  turn  be  sacrificed.  Their  sentence  was  executed 
in  the  streets,  or  even  on  the  steps  of  the  Temple,  on  occa- 
sions of  public  festival,  and  no  precautions  availed  to  pro- 
tect the  objects  of  their  enmity.8  Hitherto  the  Romans, 

1 Joseph.  Antiq.  Jud.  xx.  Y.  11. 

2 Joseph.  Antiq . Jud.  xx.  V.  5.  The  historian,  however,  ascribes  the  most 


426 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  62. 


from  policy  rather  than  respect,  had  omitted  to  occupy  Jeru- 
salem with  a military  force.  They  were  now  invited  and 
implored  by  the  chiefs  of  the  priesthood  and  nobility,  and 
Floras  sent  a detachment  to  seize  the  city  and  protect  the 
lives  of  his  adherents.  This  was  the  point  to  which  the 
Zealots  themselves  had  wished  to  lead  him.  On  entering 
the  walls  the  Romans  found  the  roofs  thronged  with  an  ex- 
cited and  mutinous  population ; they  were  assailed  first  with 
stones,  then  with  more  deadly  weapons : and  when  they  had 
succeeded  in  forcing  their  way  to  the  strong  places  of  the 
„■  . city,  and  taken  possession  of  them,  they  were 

Insurrection  at  J 7 r . / 

Jerusalem.  Ca-  unable  to  communicate  among  themselves,  or 

pitulation  and  . . ° 

massacre  of  a with  the  stations  behind  them.  The  procurator 
at  Caesarea  shrank  from  sending  a larger  force, 
to  become  entangled  in  similar  difficulties.  In  the  popular 
councils  the  Zealots  were  now  triumphant.  Agrippa  in  vain 
harangued  the  multitude  in  favour  of  his  patrons.  He  found 
it  prudent  to  withdraw  in  haste  to  his  own  territories.  The 
Idumean  dynasty  ceased  to  reign  even  in  the  hearts  of  the 
patriots.  They  looked  back  to  the  glorious  era  of  the  Macca- 
bees. The  Lower  City  and  the  Temple  were  abandoned  to 
the  people,  while  the  Romans  held  the  citadel,  with  the  pal- 
ace, and  other  heights  and  towers  of  the  Upper  City  on 
Mount  Zion,  where  the  Roman  banners  waved  over  the 
chiefs  of  the  Herodian  or  Romanizing  faction.  For  seven 
days  the  possession  of  these  respective  strongholds  was  more 
or  less  warmly  contested;  but  the  conflict  resulted  in  the 
conflagration  of  the  royal  residence  and  other  buildings  on 
Zion,  the  capture  of  the  citadel,  the  slaughter  of  the  high- 
priest  Ananias,  and  finally  the  capitulation  of  the  Romans. 
But  the  Zealots  were  resolved  to  render  accommodation  im- 
possible, and  involve  the  nation  in  inexpiable  guilt.  The 
capitulation  was  ruthlessly  violated  and  every  armed  invader 
passed  on  the  edge  of  the  sword.1 

daring  of  these  assassinations,  that  of  the  priest  Jonathan,  to  the  instigation  of 
the  governor  Felix. 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  ii.  17.  10. 


A.  U.  815.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


427 


Cestius  Gallus,  the  governor  of  Syria,  had  been  preparing 
to  succour  his  advanced  detachment  with  the  forces  of  the 
province.  He  put  himself  at  the  head  of  the  Disastrous  ex- 
Twelfth  legion,  with  six  thousand  men  picked  SafGaUus068" 
from  other  corps,  and  several  thousands  of  aux-  66 

diaries.  Agrippa  was  required  to  attend  the  ex-  A>Tr- 819* 
pedition.  The  Jews  rushed  forth  from  Jerusalem  and  the 
neighbouring  cities,  to  meet  this  array.  Enthusiasm  supplied 
the  place  of  discipline  and  training,  and,  to  the  surprise  of 
all  but  those  who  believed  in  the  divinity  of  their  mission, 
they  broke  the  ranks  of  the  advancing  Romans,  and  repulsed 
them  with  the  loss  of  five  hundred  men.  Gallus  was  saved 
from  total  rout  only  by  his  numerous  cavalry,  in  which  arm 
the  Jews,  unprepared  and  ill-appointed,  were  wholly  defi- 
cient. For  three  days  the  proconsul  kept  within  his  en- 
trenched camp,  which  the  insurgents  had  not  the  means  of 
attacking ; then,  resuming  courage,  he  advanced  again 
towards  Jerusalem.  At  the  instance  of  Agrippa  he  even 
proffered  terms  of  accommodation.  But  the  Jews,  headed 
by  the  resolute  Simon,  son  of  Giora,  not  only  refused  to  en- 
tertain them,  but  received  the  bearers  with  a shower  of  ar- 
rows. Thereupon  Gallus  led  his  troops  to  the  gates,  and 
renewed  his  assaults  on  various  points  for  five  days.  Every 
attack  was  steadily  repelled,  and  day  by  day  the  defenders 
cast  headlong  from  the  walls  the  most  noted  partisans  of 
Rome,  whom  they  caught  still  lurking  in  the  stronghold  of 
national  independence.  The  position  of  Jerusalem,  held  by 
desperate  men,  defied  an  irregular  assault.  Meanwhile  the 
population  was  rising  on  the  rear  and  flanks  of  the  assail- 
ants. Gallus  was  compelled  to  retire  once  more  to  the  con- 
fines of  his  province,  with  the  loss  of  five  thousand  men, 
many  officers,  and  the  eagle  of  his  legion.  In  dismay  he 
announced  to  the  proconsul  that  all  Judea  was  in  rebellion. 
Florus  hastened  to  fix  on  his  subordinate  the  blame  of  this 
serious  disaster.  Though  we  are  not  informed  what  meas- 
ures were  taken  against  him,  it  would  seem  from  an  express- 
ion of  Tacitus  that  his  death,  which  occurred  only  a few 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


428 


[A.  D.  67. 


Yespasian  ap- 
pointed to  con- 
duct operations 
against  the 
Jews. 

A.  D.  67. 

A.  it.  820. 


months  later,  was  ascribed  by  many  to  chagrin  or  apprehen- 
sion.1 

The  defeat  of  Gallus  had  occurred  in  the  first  days  of 
October,  66  ; and  the  account  of  it  reached  Nero  in  Greece.2 

The  importance  of  the  crisis  was  at  once  under- 
stood. Nero  had  no  abler  captain  than  Yespa- 
sian, and  this  man  was  chosen  accordingly  to 
command  the  Roman  forces  in  the  disturbed  re- 
gion.3 The  commotions  so  often  recurring  in  Ju- 
dea had  evidently  come  to  a head,  and  required  complete 
and  final  suppression.  Yespasian  was  directed  to  proceed 
by  land  into  Syria,  collecting  troops  and  war-engines  on  his 
route,  while  Titus  took  ship  for  Alexandria,  and  summoned 
from  thence  the  Fifteenth  legion,  to  serve  in  the  impending 
campaign.  By  the  spring  of  the  next  year  a force  of  three 
legions,  with  a full  complement  of  allies  and  auxiliaries,  was 
mustered  at  Ptolemais,  a convenient  spot  for  the  protection 
of  the  districts  which  still  adhered  to  the  Romans,  and  at 
the  same  time  for  conducting  operations  against  Galilee  on 
one  side,  and  Judea  on  the  other.4 

The  six  months’  interval  which  had  elapsed  had  not  been 
unemployed  by  the  Jews.  The  party  which  favoured  the 
The  chiefs  of  Roman  domination  had  already  been  crushed 
in  its  head-quarters  at  Jerusalem ; its  scattered 
members  had  taken  refuge  in  the  Roman  camps. 
But  the  nation  was  still  divided  into  two  fac- 
tions, that  of  the  Zealots,  the  assertors  of  national  independ- 
ence, resolved  to  regain  their  freedom  or  perish,  and  the  He- 
rodians,  who,  still  hoping  to  retain  their  place  among  the 
nations,  were  willing  to  accept  a compromise,  and  acknowl- 
edge, as  the  price  of  existence,  the  supremacy  of  a foreign 


the  Jewish 
parties. 


A.  d.  67. 
A.  IT.  820, 


1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  ii.  19. ; Suet.  Vespas.  4. : Tac.  Hist.  v.  10. 

2 Clinton,  Fast.  Rom.  i.  48. 

3 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  iii.  1.  2. : p6vov  evpicKet  Oveairaciavov  raig  xPeiaiC 
avaTioyovvra. 

4 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  iii.  2.  4.  The  legionary  force  amounted  to  18,000,  the 
auxiliaries  to  20,000,  the  allied  contingents  to  20,000  more  {Bell.  Jud.  iii. 
4.  2.). 


A.  U.  820.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


429 


government.  Of  the  one  party  the  most  prominent  chiefs 
were  Simon  Bargiora,  Eleazar,  and  John  of  Giscala,  all  of 
whom  became  notorious  in  the  events  which  followed : while 
of  the  other,  more  respectable  for  rank  and  station,  the  leader 
was  the  high-priest  Ananus  or  Annas.  The  merits  of  Ana- 
nus,  if  we  may  believe  Josephus,  were  equal  to  his  position, 
and,  had  he  lived,  his  views,  it  was  conceived,  might  have 
retained  the  ascendency,  and  preserved  Jerusalem  together 
with  the  nationality,  if  not  the  independence  of  the  Jews. 
At  this  moment,  indeed,  whatever  jealousies  might  exist  be- 
tween them,  both  parties  still  acted  ostensibly  in  concert ; 
but  the  second  was  the  more  powerful  of  the  two,  and,  in  the 
measures  of  defence  they  adopted  in  common,  it  was  to  the 
captains  of  the  Herodian  faction  that  the  most  considerable 
commands  were  intrusted. 

The  Sanhedrim  had  been  converted  into  a council  of  war, 
and  had  divided  Palestine  into  seven  military  districts,  be- 
sides that  of  the  capital  itself.  Of  these,  the  most  Vespasian’s 
important,  from  wealth  and  population  as  well  ^r8eC°t?d^i?st 
as  from  its  advanced  position  on  the  frontier  of  Galilee- 
Syria,  embraced  the  Upper  and  Lower  Galilee,  and  was 
occupied  by  a strong  line  of  posts  from  the  sea  to  the  Lake 
of  Tiberias.  But  the  rich  plain  of  Esdraelon,  which  lay  be- 
tween this  mountain  zone  and  Samaria,  was  overshadowed 
by  the  Roman  fortress  of  Ptolemais ; and  the  tetrarchy  of 
Agrippa,  which  reached  to  the  border,  of  the  lake,  menaced 
Galilee  on  its  eastern  flank.  Strong  as  it  was  by  nature,  and 
abounding  in  strong  as  well  as  populous  cities,  Galilee  was 
critically  placed  between  the  outposts  of  the  enemy,  and  the 
chief  to  whom  it  was  entrusted  was  expected  to  maintain  it 
from  its  own  resources,  with  little  hope  of  support  from  the 
centre  of  the  J ewish  power.  Cestius  Gallus  had  aimed  a 
rash  blow  at  Jerusalem  itself;  but  the  new  leader  of  the 
Romans,  warned  by  his  defeat,  deemed  it  prudent  to  adopt 
other  tactics,  and  it  was  Vespasian’s  plan  to  isolate  Galilee 
from  Samaria  and  Judea,  and  effect  its  complete  reduction 
before  he  turned  his  arms  against  the  hostile  metropolis. 


430 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  67. 


The  command  in  Galilee  was  given  by  the  Sanhedrim  to 
Josephus,  the  son  of  Matthias,  the  celebrated  historian,  as  he 
_ , , afterwards  became,  of  the  war,  and  compiler  of 

Josephus,  the  ....  . . r 

historian,  the  Antiquities  of  his  nation.  He  belonged  to 


placed  in  com-  . 

mand  of  Gaii-  an  ancient  and  noble  family,  and  was  noted 

well  as 


lee. 


already  for  his  learning  and  abilities 
for  his  birth.  He  had  visited  Rome ; and,  besides  being 
distinguished  with  the  favour  of  Poppaea,  had  been  disposed, 
by  what  he  had  witnessed  of  the  splendour  of  the  republic, 
to  acquiesce  in  her  conquering  destiny.1  He  was  not  more 
than  thirty  years  of  age,  a time  of  life,  as  he  remarks,  when, 
if  a man  has  happily  escaped  sin,  he  can  scarcely  guard  him- 
self against  slander.2  The  circumstance,  indeed,  of  his  voy- 
age to  Rome,  and  introduction  to  the  imperial  household, 
gave  rise  perhaps  to  jealousies  and  suspicions,  and  when  on 
his  return  he  avowed  the  moderation  of  his  views,  and  his 
belief  in  Roman  invincibility,  he  became  no  doubt  an  object 
of  hostility  and  possibly  of  misrepresentation  to  patriots  of  a 
more  ardent  stamp.  But  the  Herodians,  as  has  been  said, 
now  prevailed  in  the  Jewish  councils,  and  Josephus  was 
deputed  to  take  command  in  Galilee,  and  conduct  the  de- 
fence of  that  region  in  the  way  he  deemed  most  conducive  to 
the  general  interest. 

In  the  history  he  has  given  us  of  the  Jewish  War,  Jose- 
phus dwells,  as  might  be  expected,  with  great  minuteness,  on 
his  administration  of  this  province,  which  bore 
the  brunt  of  the  first  campaign  against  the  Ro- 
mans. But  besides  this  general  narrative  of  the 
war,  we*  possess  a second  work  by  the  same 
author,  in  which  he  relates  the  particulars  of  his 
own  life  and  personal  adventures ; and  this 
differs  materially  in  political  colour  from  the  first.  The 
History  had  been  written  soon  after  the  events  themselves, 
in  which  he  bore  so  eminent  a part,  when  he  had  fallen  into 
the  hands  of  the  Romans,  and  had  consented  to  purchase 


Equivocal 
character  of 
Josephus.  Va- 
riation in  his 
own  account  of 
his  conduct  in 
the  “History,” 
and  in  the 
“ Life.” 


Joseph.  Vit.  3. 


2 Joseph.  Vit.  15. 


A.  U.  820.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


431 


their  favour  by  a tribute  of  unlimited  admiration.  In  this 
work  it  was  his  object  to  excuse  to  his  countrymen  his  own 
recent  defection  ; to  represent  the  fidelity  with  which  he  had 
served  their  true  interests,  as  agent  of  the  party  who  sought 
to  preserve  their  nation,  though  with  the  sacrifice  of  its  inde- 
pendence ; to  charge  on  the  rashness  of  the  Zealots  the  ruin 
which  had  actually  befallen  them,  from  which  he  had  himself 
escaped  by  timely  but  justifiable  submission.  But  in  the 
Life , which  was  composed  twenty  years  later,  in  reply  to 
the  insinuations  of  a personal  enemy,  that  he  had  deserved 
ill  both  of  Jews  and  Romans  by  the  aimless  obstinacy  of 
his  defence,  he  seeks  no  longer  to  keep  up  appearances  with 
his  countrymen,  but  devotes  all  his  ingenuity  to  showing 
that  he  was  throughout  a covert  friend  of  Rome,  seeking, 
under  the  guise  of  prudent  patriotism,  to  smooth  the  progress 
of  the  invaders,  and  deliver  Palestine  into  their  hands.  If  a 
cloud  of  suspicion  hangs  to  this  day  over  the  head  of  the 
historian,  he  owes  it  to  this  shameless  representation  of  his 
own  conduct.  The  ardent  upholders  of  a Jewish  nationality, 
which  has  survived  in  some  sense  the  fall  of  Jerusalem  nearly 
eighteen  centuries,  still  denounce  him,  from  his  own  words, 
as  a renegade  to  their  cause.1  His  equivocation  is  patent, 
and  admits  of  no  defence ; yet  I believe  that  of  the  two 
representations  he  gives  us  of  his  policy,  the  former  is  the 
nearer  to  the  truth ; — that  he  was  more  faithful  to  his  pro- 
fessions, in  fact,  than  he  wished,  at  a later  period,  to  be 
supposed ; that  he  has  falsely  accused  himself,  to  preserve 
the  favour  of  his  masters,  of  crimes  which  should  only  have 
gained  him  their  contempt.  He  seeks  in  vain  to  repudiate 
the  glory  which  must  ever  attach,  in  his  own  despite,  to  his 
skill  and  prowess.  Allowing  for  many  exaggerations  and 
misstatements  in  both,  according  to  their  respective  bias,  I 
still  regard  the  Wars,  rather  than  the  Life , as  the  genuine 
record  of  the  campaign  in  Galilee. 

If  the  resources  of  the  Jewish  people  were  unequal  to  the 
task  of  resisting  the  concentrated  energies  of  Rome,  they 

1 See  Salvador’s  History,  ii.  15.  49. 


432 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  67. 


were  far  more  formidable  than  could  have  been 

Military  re- 
sources of  ju-  expected  from  the  smallness  of  their  country,  and 

their  slender  experience  in  war.  In  extent  Pales- 
tine scarcely  equalled  one  of  the  least  of  modern  European 
states,  such  as  Belgium  or  Piedmont ; nor  was  its  soil  natu- 
rally calculated  to  support  a very  dense  population.  It  seems 
however  that,  partly  from  artificial  cultivation,  partly  from 
foreign  importations,  it  actually  maintained  more  than  pro- 
portionate numbers  : Galilee  alone,  a district  not  larger  than 
an  English  county,  could  boast  of  numerous  cities,  the  least 
of  which  contained  fifteen  thousand  inhabitants ; and  Jose- 
phus found  himself  there  at  the  head  of  a hundred  thousand 
armed  men.1  Exempted  as  the  Jews  had  generally  been 
from  the  levies  imposed  on  the  provinces,  the  flower  of  their 
youth  had  not  been  drained  to  recruit  the  cohorts  on  distant 
frontiers.  But  their  kings  had  been  required  to  maintain 
contingents  within  their  own  territories ; and  though  the 
sceptre  had  departed  from  Judah,  the  country  was  still  full 
of  soldiers  trained  to  service  under  the  Herods  and  Agrippas. 
It  had,  moreover,  been  long  infested  by  armed  bands,  who 
had  coloured  their  brigandage  with  the  name  of  patriotism, 
and  might  be  not  less  formidable  when  arrayed  under  a truly 
national  standard.  The  whole  people  recurred  with  instinc- 
tive alacrity  to  the  traditions,  still  faithfully  preserved,  of  its 
ancient  military  organization  under  Maccabaeus,  David,  and 
Joshua.  Arms  were  distributed  to  all  who  could  bear  them, 
and  more,  says  Tacitus,  claimed  the  honour  of  arming  than 
in  proportion  to  their  numbers : the  women  were  not  less 
devoted  than  the  men,  and  all  agreed  in  the  determination 
rather  to  die  than  be  expelled,  the  only  contemplated  alterna- 
tive, from  their  country.2 

1 Joseph.  Bell  Jud.  iii.  3.  It  must  be  observed,  however,  that  this  state- 
ment regarding  the  surprising  populousness  of  Galilee  should  be  accepted  with 
caution.  The  numbers  of  Josephus  are  liable  throughout  to  suspicion  of  great 
exaggeration.  In  some  cases  this  is  susceptible  of  proof,  as  will  appear;  in 
others,  if  I sometimes  adopt  his  figures  without  remark,  it  may  be  understood 
that  I do  not  on  that  account  put  any  real  confidence  in  them. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  v.  13. 


A.  U.  820.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


433 


Though  the  moderate  party,  of  which  Josephus  was  the 
instrument,  was  for  the  moment  in  the  ascendant  in  the 
council  at  Jerusalem,  he  could  not  rely  on  its 

^ Josephus  is 

maintaining  its  power  from  day  to  day,  nor  could  harassed  in  his 

. , -,-1  government  by 

it  secure  its  chiefs  from  being  harassed  by  the  the  intrigues  of 

_ , .it  -ip  *1.  t the  Zealots. 

Zealots  with  demands  for  more  violent  and  un- 
compromising measures.  If  the  governor  of  Galilee  was 
satisfied  with  arming  his  militia,  storing  and  fortifying  his 
towns,  and  presenting  to  the  Romans  a dignified  attitude  of 
resistance,  there  were  more  vehement  spirits  at  work  around 
him,  urging  him  to  spoil  and  kill  every  doubtful  partisan, 
and  challenge  the  foe  to  a war  of  sanguinary  reprisals.  The 
Zealots  of  Galilee,  who  swarmed  in  every  township,  were 
stimulated  by  a countryman,  John  of  Giscala,  a man  of  great 
influence  in  Jerusalem,  whom  Josephus  brands  without  re- 
serve as  a ruffian  and  a brigand.  The  historian  has  described 
to  us  how  this  opponent  misrepresented  all  his  actions,  how  he 
plotted  against  his  life,  corrupted  the  obedience  of  his  people, 
and  finally  incited  the  council  at  Jerusalem  to  supersede  him 
in  his  government.1  In  defeating  these  machinations  Jose- 
phus seems  to  have  employed  great  address,  and  we  may  the 
more  readily  believe  his  account  from  the  vigour  he  un- 
questionable displayed  in  preparing  for  the  defence  of  his 
province.  It  may  be  true  that  from  the  first  he  despaired 
of  successful  resistance  to  the  Romans ; his  admiration  of 
their  policy,  his  awe  at  their  military  resources,  were  un- 
worthy perhaps  of  the  leader  of  a national  insurrection,  and 
helped  to  insure  its  defeat ; nevertheless  we  must  allow  for 
the  subjugation  of  men’s  minds,  those  especially  of  the  most- 
intelligent  and  thoughtful,  by  the  long  career  of  Roman  in- 
vincibility. We  must  remember  that  the  seeds  of  decay  we 
can  already  trace  in  Roman  discipline  and  conduct  were  not 
apparent  to  the  generation  with  which  we  are  now  concerned : 
to  them  submission  to  Rome  was  prudence  and  philosophy, 
perhaps  with  some  it  was  religion.  The  Zealots  were  so  far 


1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  in.  21.,  Til.  38.  40. 
vol.  vi. — 28 


434 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  67. 


in  the  right  that  the  last  faint  hope  of  successful  resistance 
lay  in  the  rash  valour  of  obstinacy  and  blindness. 

It  was  behind  the  walls  of  Jotapata  that  Josephus  pre- 
pared to  make  his  great  stand  for  the  defence  of  his  prov- 
Josephns  de-  ince,  which  he  declined  to  imperil  by  operations 
aenddis  cap  toed  in  tlie  T^e  exact  position  of  this  place  is 

by  the  Romans.  n0£  known ; but  it  is  said  to  have  been  strong  by 
nature  as  well  as  by  art,  and  we  may  conjecture  that  it  stood 
on  one  of  the  spurs  of  the  hill-region  of  Galilee.  While 
Vespasian  was  collecting  his  forces  at  Ptolemais,  he  had  de- 
tached his  lieutenant  Placidus  to  make  a demonstration 
against  this  fortress,  but  without  result;  and  the  general 
himself  moved  against  it  at  a later  period^  with  the  main 
strength  of  his  forces.  The  fidelity  and  courage  of  Josephus, 
who  threw  himself  into  the  place,  are  sufficiently  attested  by 
his  defence  of  forty-seven  days,  by  the  repulse  of  Placidus, 
the  endurance  of  great  extremities  by  famine,  and  the  variety 
of  resources  with  which  he  baffled  the  skill  and  perseverance 
of  the  enemy.  Vespasian  was  forced  to  lead  the  assault  in 
person,  and  suffered  himself  a wound.  Josephus  indeed  ad- 
mits, possibly  to  get  favour  with  his  conquerors,  that  for  his 
own  part  he  would  have  desisted  earlier  from  a contest  he 
knew  to  be  hopeless ; but  when  the  obstinacy  of  his  coun- 
trymen would  listen  to  no  compromise,  he  gallantly  cast  in  his 
lot  with  theirs,  and  fought  at  their  head  till  the  place  was 
finally  stormed  and  captured.  The  account  he  gives  of  what 
followed  savours  strongly  of  deliberate  imposture.  He  es- 
caped, it  seems,  with  thirty-nine  of  his  comrades  into  one  of 
the  caves  with  which  the  region  abounded ; but  his  retreat 
was  discovered  to  the  Roman  commander,  who  sent  a friend 
to  offer  him  his  life.  The  fugitives,  however,  were  exasper- 
ated and  desperate ; they  would  not  suffer  their  chief  to  ca- 
pitulate. Their  cave  was  inaccessible  to  an  armed  force; 
but  the  Romans  could  have  lit  a fire  at  the  entrance,  and 
stifled  them  with  the  smoke.  V espasian,  it  is  said,  was  anxious 
to  get  possession  of  Josephus  alive,  and  forbade  this  to  be 
done.  The  fanatics,  however,  resolved  to  kill  themselves  by 


A.  U.  820.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


435 


mutual  slaughter,  and  Josephus  could  only  persuade  them 
to  abstain  from  indiscriminate  massacre,  and  draw  lots  in 
successive  pairs,  to  fall  each  on  the  sword  of  the  other.  This 
plan,  which  it  seems  had  been  recommended  to  him  in  a 
dream,  was  adopted  with  enthusiasm,  and,  strange  to  relate, 
Josephus  himself  and  another  were  left  last,  when  all  the 
rest  had  perished.  He  persuaded  this  irresolute  survivor  to 
save  both  their  lives  by  surrender,  and  the  astute  defender 
of  Jotapata  shelters  his  character  for  patriotism  behind  the 
manifest  interposition  of  Providence.1 

Nor,  it  seems,  did  the  favour  of  Heaven  stop  here.  Jo- 
sephus was  brought  a prisoner  to  Vespasian,  and  it  was  an- 
nounced to  him  that  he  should  be  sent  as  a pledge  Josephus  se- 
of  victory  to  Nero.  This  he  knew  too  well  v^Sof  vSpa- 
would  be  the  certain  prelude  to  his  execution ; 8ian* 
but  at  this  crisis  he  was  inspired  to  predict  to  the  Roman 
general  the  imperial  fortunes  which  awaited  him.  Vespa- 
sian, whose  ear  was  ever  open  to  pretenders  to  supernatural 
knowledge,  listened  and  believed.  Josephus  secured  his 
favour,  and  was  carried  about  for  some  years  by  his  con- 
queror in  a custody  which  he  had  no  inclination  perhaps  to 
evade.  Admitted  finally  among  the  clients  of  the  emperor’s 
house,  he  adopted  the  name  of  Titus  Flavius,  and  attached 
himself  to  his  patron’s  retinue  at  Rome.2 * * 

By  the  capture  of  Jotapata  and  the  governor  of  the  prov- 
ince the  resistance  of  Galilee  was  completely  broken.  Ves- 
pasian returned  with  his  victorious  army  to  Ptol-  Eeduction  of 
emais  before  the  end  of  June,  and  thence  re-  ^^eofJop- 
moved  to  Caesarea  on  the  Mediterranean,  where  pa* 
the  Greek  population  urged  him,  but  without  success,  to 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  iii.  7.  It  seems  to  have  been  an  object  with  Josephus 
to  recommend  himself  to  the  credulous  Vespasian  as  a man  favoured  with  vis- 
ions and  prophetic  inspiration.  The  story  in  the  text  was,  I have  no  doubt, 
fabricated  with  this  view. 

2 At  the  close  of  this  war  Josephus  received  grants  of  land  in  Judea  from 

the  conqueror,  together  with  an  annual  pension  and  the  Roman  franchise. 

Joseph.  Vit.  76.  “A  chacun  selon  ses  oeuvres,”  says  Salvador,  bitterly  con- 


436 


HISTORF  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  67. 


sacrifice  his  distinguished  prisoner.  With  two  legions  now 
stationed  at  this  place,  and  two  advanced  to  Scythopolis  in 
the  interior,  he  cut  off  the  communications  of  Galilee  with 
Judea,  and  was  enabled  to  carry  on  at  leisure  the  pacifica- 
tion of  the  northern  districts.  The  only  maritime  place  re- 
tained by  the  Jews  was  Joppa,  where  they  had  mustered  a 
naval  force  for  the  annoyance  of  the  Romans,  whose  supplies 
came,  we  must  suppose,  in  a great  measure  from  Egypt. 
The  Romans  sent  a detachment  to  occupy  the  town,  which 
made  no  resistance,  the  people  taking  to  their  ships.  A 
storm  dashed  their  armaments  in  pieces,  and  all  that  escaped 
the  sea  were  massacred  on  shore.  The  town  was  destroyed, 
and  a garrison  established  amidst  its  ruins,  to  prevent  the 
recovery  of  its  convenient  roadstead.1 

The  tactics  of  Yespasian  were  slow  and  cautious.  He 
was  prepared  to  devote  more  than  one  campaign  to  making 
sure  his  ground  before  advancing  to  the  assault 

Capture  of  Ti-  , , . . 

terias  and  Ta-  oi  J erusaiem.  in  the  course  oi  this  summer  he 
conferred  with  Agrippa  at  Csesarea-Philippi,  to 
arrange  perhaps  the  best  mode  of  co-operation  with  the  most 
powerful  dependent  of  the  empire,  and  the  tetrarch,  who  well 
knew  where  his  own  interests  lay,  displayed  his  zeal  in  the 
Roman  cause  by  a series  of  sumptuous  entertainments.  His 
sister  Berenice,  since  the  death  of  a first  husband  and  her 
own  desertion  of  a second,  had  continued  to  reside  with  him, 
and  rumours  prevailed  about  the  character  of  their  connex- 
ion more  revolting  to  western  ears  than  to  eastern.2  If  we 
may  believe  the  statement  of  Josephus,  Berenice  must  have 
been  thirty-nine  years  of  age  at  this  time,  when  she  became 
perhaps  first  known  to  Titus,  twelve  years  her  junior : we 

trasting  this  gilded  servitude  with  the  fate  of  the  real  patriots  of  Jerusalem. 
Salvador,  ii.  467. 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  iii.  8. 

2 Juvenal,  vi.  158. : “Barbaras  incestae  dedit  hunc  Agrippa  sorori.”  After 
the  death  of  Herod,  king  of  Chalcis,  a.  d.  48,  Berenice  was  united  Ptolemo,  king 
of  Cilicia.  She  was  living  with  Agrippa  a.  d.  60,  when  St.  Paul  appeared  before 
them  at  Caesarea. 


A.  U.  820.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


437 


shall  find  that  ten  years  later  he  was  even  then  passionately 
enamoured  of  her.  But  the  Roman  general  was  still  con- 
ducting his  operations  with  unremitting  activity.  In  August 
Tiberias  surrendered,  and  Tarichea  was  stormed  in  Septem- 
ber. The  capture  of  this  last  place  was  followed  by  an  ap- 
palling atrocity,  for  which  we  can  discover  no  excuse,  nor 
was  any  advanced  for  it.  Josephus  relates  with  little  emo- 
tion that  the  whole  population  was  collected  in  the  Stadium, 
the  infirm  and  old,  twelve  hundred  in  number,  were  at  once 
put  to  death,  six  thousand  of  the  younger  were  sent  to  work 
at  the  cutting  of  the  Isthmus,  the  rest,  to  the  number  of 
thirty  thousand,  were  sold  publicly  as  slaves.1  Doubtless 
the  barbarity  of  the  Romans,  if  it  was  really  such  as  is  here 
represented,  was  not  unprovoked  by  similar  excesses  on  the 
part  of  their  opponents  ; and  henceforth  we  shall  find  both 
sides  rivalling  each  other  in  remorseless  bloodshed,  whenever 
opportunity  offered.2  In  no  work  are  the  hideous  features 
of  ancient  warfare  so  nakedly  portrayed  as  in  the  pages  of 
the  Jewish  historian.  With  the  end  of  the  year  all  northern 
Palestine  had  fallen  into  the  hands  of  the  conquerors,  and 
John  of  Giscala,  who  had  proved  incapable  of  replacing  the 
governor  he  had  denounced  as  a traitor,  had  sought  refuge 
in  Jerusalem;  so  God  willed  it,  says  his  opponent,  for  the 
destruction  of  the  city.* 

The  campaign  of  68  was  conducted  by  Vespasian  on  the 
same  principles  as  the  preceding.  He  still  refrained  from 
any  attempt  on  Jerusalem,  and  when  urged  to  n 

. J 7 ° Second  cam- 

stnke  at  the  head  of  the  Jewish  confederation,  paignofves- 

. . ...  , pasian.  Reduc- 

already  weakened  by  intestine  divisions,  he  re-  tion  of  Persea. 
plied  that  it  was  best  to  leave  nothing  to  chance,  a.  d.  6a 
and  to  let  the  success  of  his  operations  be  worked 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  iii.  9,  10.  I have  already  given  a caution  with  regard 
to  the  habitual  exaggeration  of  Josephus.  He  was  disposed  to  magnify  the 
sufferings  of  the  Jews,  in  excuse  for  his  own  temporizing  counsels.  It  should  be 
remembered  that  his  history,  composed  in  Greek,  was  not  written  for  the 
Romans. 

3 Josephus,  in  his  bitter  enmity  towards  the  chiefs  of  the  Zealots,  had  a 
strong  motive  to  make  the  worst  of  their  misdeeds. 

Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  iv.  1.  10.,  iv.  2,  3. 


438 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  63. 


out  by  tbe  hands  of  his  opponents.  Two  officers,  Placidus 
and  Trajanus,  the  father  of  the  future  emperor  of  that  name, 
ravaged  the  district  beyond  Jordan,  and  drove  multitudes 
of  its  houseless  people  towards  the  treacherous  defences  of 
the  capital.  Urging  before  them  all  their  flocks  and  herds, 
as  in  the  great  national  migration  of  seventeen  centuries 
before,  the  fugitives  were  arrested  by  the  swollen  waters  of 
the  river,  and  massacred  with  frightful  slaughter.1  But 
many  thousands  still  escaped  to  swell  the  throng,  which  was 
destined  to  be  cooped  within  the  capital  when  at  length  the 
Roman  armies  approached  it.  Vespasian  was  at  the  same 
time  drawing  on  from  the  opposite  quarter ; and  his  progress, 
as  before,  was  marked  with  flames  and  devastation,  and  al- 
most incredible  bloodshed.  His  outposts  were  advanced  to 
Jericho ; but  in  the  middle  of  the  year  he  withdrew  from 
active  operations,  fixing  himself  at  Caesarea,  and  listening 
for  the  first  report  of  the  impending  revolutions  in  the  West, 
while  Titus  was  sent  to  confer  with  Mucianus  at  Antioch, 
and  discuss  matters  of  deeper  interest  to  both  father  and 
son,  than  the  means  to  be  employed  for  reducing  a provin- 
cial capital. 

During  all  the  following  year  warfare  was  suspended  on 
the  part  of  the  Romans.  Confiding  perhaps  in  the  omens 
Suspension  of  and  prophecies  which  assured  him  of  the  event- 
dSngtife  ual  succession,  Vespasian  seems  to  have  watched 
succefsionT the  r^se  l50!!1  °f  Galba  and  Otho,  without  falter- 
A D 69  ing  in  his  own  anticipations,  and  to  have  reserved 
a.  u.  822.  strength  of  his  legions  for  the  crisis  evidently 

approaching.  By  Mucianus  in  Syria,  by  Tiberius  Alexander 
in  Egypt,  by  Agrippa  and  Berenice  in  the  centre  of  Pales- 
tine, his  interests  were  diligently  served,  and  in  the  year  69, 
as  we  have  seen,  he  was  saluted  emperor  by  his  troops,  and 
irrevocably  launched  on  the  career  of  ambition.  It  was  ar- 
ranged that  Mucianus  should  conduct  the  war  against  Vitel- 
lius  in  Europe,  that  Vespasian  should  seize  in  person  the 


1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  iv.  8. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


439 


granaries  of  Egypt,  that  Agrippa  should  betake  himself  to 
Rome,  and  intrigue  for  him  with  the  nobles  in  the  capital ; 
while  to  Titus  was  committed  the  charge  of  the  contest  in 
Palestine,  which  his  father,  still  faithful  to  the  traditions  of 
the  service,  would  not  consent  to  abandon  even  with  the 
empire  in  view. 

The  admiration  our  Jewish  historian  has  expressed  for 
the  power  and  greatness  of  Rome  stands  remarkably  in  con- 
trast with  the  scornful  disparagement  of  the  sources  of 
Jews  in  which  his  Roman  rival  indulges.1  Of  SppSS 
the  narrative  of  the  war,  as  it  was  written  by  b7  Tacitus. 
Tacitus,  we  possess  a fragment  only.  The  Histories , the  first 
of  his  longer  works,  commence  with  the  consulship  of  Galba 
in  69,  and  the  author,  preserving  strictly  the  annalistic  form 
he  had  prescribed  himself,  reviews  in  a few  lines  only  the 
circumstances  of  the  war  in  question,  as  conducted  up  to 
that  date  by  Gallus  and  Vespasian.2  The  year  69,  he  says, 
was  devoted  to  the  civil  contest,  and  no  hostile  movement 
was  attempted  by  Titus  until  peace  was  restored  at  home, 
and  the  empire  had  finally  passed  into  the  hands  of  his 
father.  It  is  from  this  point  that  his  own  narrative  com- 
mences, and  this  is  again  broken  off,  after  a few  introductory 
chapters,  by  the  accident  which  has  deprived  us  of  the  re- 
mainder of  the  work.3 * * * * 8  We  may  conjecture,  indeed,  that  in 
' the  later  composition  to  which  he  gave  the  name  of  Annals , 
in  which  he  traced  the  earlier  history  from  Tiberius  to  Nero, 
the  story  of  the  first  campaigns  was  supplied,  and  occupied 

1 Josephus  {Bell.  Jud.  iii.  5.)  gives  an  interesting  account  of  the  Roman 
armies,  adding : ravra  pev  ovv  diet-jjMov  ov  'P upaiovg  ETcaiviGcu  Trpocupovfievoc 
togovtov , ogov  elg  re  Trapapvd'cav  tuv  Kexeipopevwv,  Kal  elg  cnrorpoTr^v  rav 
veurept^6vruv. 

2 Tac.  Hist.  v.  10. : “ Duravit  tamen  patientia  Judaeis  usque  ad  Gessium  rio- 

rum procuratorem.  Sub  eo  helium  ortum,  et  comprimere  coeptantem  Cestium 

Galium,  Syriae  legatum,  varia  proelia,  ac  ssepius  adversa,  excepere.  Quid  ubi 

fato  aut  taedio  occidit,  missu  Neronis  Vespasianus  fortuna  famaque  et  egregiis 

ministris  (e.  g.  the  father  of  Trajan),  intra  duas  aestates  cuncta  camporum,  om- 

nesque  praeter  Hierosolyma  urbes,  victore  exercitu  tenebat.” 

8 Tac.  Hist.  v.  1-13. 


440 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  69. 


under  its  proper  years  the  important  place  it  merited.  But 
this  portion  of  the  Annals  also  is  lost,  and  the  Roman  ac- 
count of  the  most  terrible  conflict  of  the  empire  appears  as 
a mutilated  trunk,  boldly  designed  and  colossal  in  propor- 
tions, but  shorn  of  the  head  and  limbs,  the  beginning  and 
the  conclusion.  Thus  disappointed  we  look  with  the  more 
interest  to  a sketch  preserved  us  of  the  antiquities  of  the 
Jewish  nation,  from  which  we  derive  at  least  an  insight  into 
the  spirit  in  which  Tacitus  approached  his  subject,  and  the 
estimate  he  may  be  supposed  to  have  formed  of  that  people’s 
character.  With  the  works  of  Philo  and  Josephus,  not  to 
mention  the  sacred  records  of  the  Jews,  within  his  reach,  it 
must  strike  us  with  surprise  that  so  grave  a writer  should  be 
content  to  refer,  for  the  instruction  of  his  countrymen,  to  the 
loose  conjectures  of  Greek  mythologers  and  fabulists.  While 
there  were  thousands  of  native  Jews  and  proselytes  at  Rome, 
instructed  in  the  narrative  of  Moses,  he  preferred,  it  seems, 
to  draw  his  information  from  the  hostile  Egyptians  frequent- 
ing the  camps  of  Titus  and  Vespasian,  and  swallowed  with- 
out reflection  the  figments  of  Manetho  and  the  pretended 
sages  of  Alexandria.1  The  story  of  the  Jewish  people,  thus 
communicated  to  Tacitus,  is  exposed  to  the  scorn  of  their 
conquerors  in  such  language  as  the  following : 

Before  relating  the  final  destruction  of  this  famous  city , 
it  will  be  well  to  explain  its  origin . The  Judcei , it  is  reported , 

Tacitus's  flyin9  from  the  island  of  Crete , alighted  on  the 

strange  mis-  farthest  corner  of  Libya , at  the  period  when 

of  the  origin  of  baturn  was  driven  from  his  realm  by  Jupiter . 
the  character  of  This  fact  is  established  from  their  name:  Ida  is 
their  religion.  ^ famous  mountain  in  Crete , and  its  people , the 

Idoei , became  denominated  with  a barbaric  extension  of  the 

1 Comp.  Joseph,  c.  Apion.  i.  25. : ruv  6e  Etg  rj/xag  ^kaa^Tj/ubiV  qp^avro 
fzev  A'lyvrcnoi  • (3ovk6fi£Voi  6e  EKs'ivoig  rtveg  xaptfrGdai,  TcapaTpeneiv  etzex^PV 
cav  TTjv  akrjOEiav,  ovre  tvv  etg  Alyvirrov  cujnt-iv,  ug  kyivETO , re iv  jj/iETepov 
TzpoySvuv  opoloyovvTEg , ovte  ttjv  e^oSov  akpOevovreg , k.  t.  k.  He  particularly 
instances  Manetho  and  Chseremon  as  circulating  falsehoods  about  the  origin  of 
the  Jews,  and  these  appear  to  have  been  the  sources  to  which  Tacitus  chiefly 
referred. 


A.U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


441 


sound , Judoei.  Some  relate  that  in  the  reign  of  Isis  a mul- 
titude of  people,  overflowing  the  limits  of  Egypt,  cast  them- 
selves on  the  neighbouring  countries  under  chiefs  named 
Hierosolymus  and  Judas.  Others  again  assert  that  the  Jews 
were  a swarm  of  Ethiopians,  driven  by  internal  animosities 
to  flee  their  country  in  the  days  of  Cepheus.  Again  it  is 
related  that  certain  wanderers  from  Assyria,  in  quest  of 
lands,  occupied  a part  of  Egypt,  and  quicldy  possessed  them- 
selves of  Hebrew  towns  and  territories,  and  the  regions  bor- 
dering upon  Syria.  Finally,  another  tradition  assigns  them 
a nobler  origin,  declaring  that  their  city  Hierosolyma  icas 
built  and  named  by  the  Solymi,  the  (Lycian)  people  cele- 
brated by  Homer } 

The  idea  present  to  the  writer’s  mind  in  regard  to  all 
these  derivations,  except'  the  last,  was  that  the  Jews  were 
properly  no  nation  at  all,  hut  only  the  scum  and  offscouring 
of  a nation,  and  as  such  were  entitled  to  none  of  the  observ- 
ance due,  by  the  comity  of  nations,  to  the  acknowledged 
lords  of  earth.  It  was  only  by  establishing  their  descent 
from  an  Homeric  people,  as  Tacitus,  perhaps  reluctantly, 
suggests,  that  they  could  pretend  to  claim  in  their  favour 
the  protection  of  international  law,  as  understood  by  anti- 
quity. 

Most  writers  agree,  he  continues,  that  a loathsome  shin  dis- 
order once  prevailing  in  Egypt,  king  Bocchoris  was  com- 
manded by  the  oracle  of  Hammon  to  purge  his  realm  of  this 
brood  of  people,  and  dismiss  them  to  other  lands,  as  hateful  to 
the  gods . Thus  brought  together  and  abandoned  in  the  desert, 
when  the  rest  were  overwhelmed  with  their  distress , Moses, 
one  of  the  exiles',  exhorted  them  to  expect  no  help  from  gods 

or  men,  but  to  trust  in  him  as  a divine  leader They 

consented,  and  commenced  their  journey  at  random,  with  no 
idea  whither  they  were  going,  or  with  what  object.  Nothing 
so  distressed  them  as  the  want  of  water.  And  now  they  were 
reduced  to  the  last  extremity,  and  flung  themselves  in  despair 


1 Tac.  Hist.  v.  3. 


442 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMAN'S 


[AD.  69. 


upon  the  ground , when  a herd  of  wild  asses  was  seen  making 
its  way  from  feeding  to  a hill  covered  with  wood.  Moses 
followed , expecting  them  to  lead  to  some  grassy  spot , and  dis- 
covered abundant  springs  under  their  guidance.  Thus  re- 
freshed^ the  fugitives  completed  a journey  of  six  days , and 
on  the  seventh  took  possession  of  lands , driving  out  their 
owners , where  they  founded  their  city , and  consecrated  their 
temple.  To  make  himself  a nation  for  the  time  to  come , 
Moses  appointed  them  new  rites , opposed  to  those  of  all  man- 
kind besides.  Among  them  every  thing  elsewhere  sacred  is 
held pro fane  ; to  them  all  things  are  lawful  which  among  us 
are  forbidden.  They  have  consecrated  in  their  temple  a fig- 
ure of  the  brute  by  the  guidance  of  which  they  slaked  their 
thirst  and  found  their  way  in  the  desert  / and  they  sacrifice 
rams  there , on  purpose,  it  should  seem , to  cast  insult  upon 
Hammon.1  They  slay  the  ox  also , which  the  Egyptians 

1 Tac.  Hist.  v.  4. : “ Effigiem  animalis,  quo  monstrante  errorem  sitimque 
depulerant,  penetraU  sacravere.”  The  writer  cannot  mean  to  imply  that  the 
image  of  an  ass  was  worshipped  in  the  Jewish  temple,  for  he  says,  immediately 
afterwards,  that  the  fane  was  vacant.  He  had  heard,  perhaps,  that  such  a 
figure  was  kept  there  as  a votive  offering.  However  the  notion  arose,  the  wor- 
ship of  an  ass,  or  more  properly  of  an  ass’s  head,  was  long  objected  to  the  Jews 
by  their  opponents  (see  Joseph,  c.  Apion.  ii.  6,  7.),  and  afterwards  to  the  Chris- 
tians. Tertull.  Apol.  16. : Minuc.  Felix,  Octav.  28. 

Recent  excavations  on  the  Aventine  have  discovered  the  representation, 
scratched  on  the  wall,  of  a human  figure  with  an  ass’s  head,  crucified,  a man  in 
the  act  of  worshipping  it,  with  the  inscription : ’Alegayevog,  aiberai  &e6v.  See 
the  Dublin  Review  for  March,  1857.  This,  it  is  conjectured,  is  a caricature  of 
Christian  worship,  in  accordance  with  the  well-known  statement  in  Tertullian. 
The  head,  however,  is  allowed  to  be  more  like  that  of  a horse  than  of  an  ass. 
I may  remind  the  reader  of  the  passage  in  Pliny  {Hist.  Nat.  viil  64.),  in  which 
he  says  that  Caesar  had  a horse  with  human  forefeet,  as  represented  in  the 
statue  before  the  temple  of  Venus.  The  story  is  copied  by  Suetonius  {Jvl.  61.) 
and  Dion  (lvii.  54.).  The  existence  of  such  a statue,  which  every  citizen  must 
have  seen  daily,  cannot  be  questioned,  however  absurd  the  popular  notion 
about  it  which  these  writers  so  gravely  embraced.  But  some  lines  in  Statius 
{Sylv.  i.  1.  84.)  seem  to  throw  light  on  the  subject.  Comparing  the  equestrian 
statue  of  Domitian  with  that  of  Caesar,  he  says : 

“ Cedat  equus  Latiae  qui  contra  templa  Diones 
Caesarei  stat  scde  fori,  quern  traderis  ausus 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


443 


worship  as  their  god  Apis.  They  abstain  from  swine's  flesh, 
in  memory  of  the  plague  of  scabs  from  which  they  had  suf- 
fered',  to  which  that  animal  is  subject.  By  numerous  fasts 
they  attest  the  long  famine  they  endured , and  their  unleav- 
ened bread  bears  witness  to  the  hurry  in  which  they  snatched 
their  corn  for  their  journey.  The  seventh  day , they  say , 
was  appointed  for  rest , because  they  then  ceased  from  their 
miseries , and  from  thence  they  have  gone  on  to  indulge  them- 
selves with  a cessation  from  labour  every  seventh  year  also. 
Others  affirm  that  this  is  done  in  honour  of  Saturn  : whether 
because  they  got  the  rudiments  of  their  cult  from  the  Idceans, 
or  because , of  the  seven  planets  that  sway  the  destinies  of 
man,  that  of  Saturn  is  loftiest  and  most  potent.  . . . 

From  the  base  origin  of  these  gipsy  wanderers  it  would 
follow,  in  the  mind  of  Tacitus,  that  their  destinies  were  vul- 
gar and  terrene.  Xo  God  was  their  patron,  no  wonders  were 
wrought  for  them ; their  rites  were  of  no  divine  intuition, 
their  usages  were  uninspired  by  a breath  of  superior  intelli- 
gence. Their  ceremonies,  divested  of  the  charm  of  imme- 
morial mystery,  were  plain  prosaic  references  to  the  most 
obvious  phenomena  of  nature.  In  this,  as  in  all  other  re- 

Pellaso,  Lysippe,  duci ; mox  Caesaris  ora 
Aurata  cervice  tulit.” 

I venture  to  suggest  that  this  work  of  Lysippus  was  the  man-horse  in  question, 
and  was  symbolical  of  Alexander’s  power  or  divinity.  Caesar  carried  it  off  from 
Syria,  and  replaced  the  head  of  the  rider  with  his  own.  Mionnet,  MedaiV.es 
Antiques,  Supplement,  tom.  v.  art.  861.,  thus  describes  a coin  of  Nicaea : 

“ M.  ANT.  TOPAIANOC.  AT.  Tete  radiee,  avec  un  bouclier  et  un  javelot 
sur  l’epaule  droite. 

“Revers:  innON.  BPOTOnOAA.  NIKAIEGN.  Heros  & cheval,  la  tete 
couverte  du  bonnet  Phrygien,  et  tenant  de  la  main  droite  une  couronne.  Le 
cheval,  dont  les  pieds  de  dewant  sont  humains,  tient  dans  le  droit  leve  un  baton 
ou  sceptre,  autour  du  quel  est  un  serpent,  et  sa  queue  repliee  se  termine  par 
une  tete  de  serpent  [comp.  Apoeol.  ix.  19. : at  yap  ovpat  avrcxv  opoiai  vdeaiv 
exovaai  KetyaXag] ; une  petite  Yictoire  vole  au  devant  du  heros  pour  le  cou- 
ronner.” 

In  Creuzer’s  Religions  de  VAntiquite  (Guignaut)  I find  (i.  i.  p.  190.)  that 
Vishnu  is  expected  to  appear  in  his  tenth  avatar  on  horseback,  or,  as  some  say, 
with  a horse's  face  and  a human  figure,  for  the  final  punishment  of  sin. 


444 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  69. 


spects,  the  Jews,  he  would  have  maintained,  were  entitled 
to  no  indulgence  from  their  conquerors,  no  sympathy  from 
the  intelligent  and  humane. 

These  fashions , he  proceeds  to  say,  however  they  were 
introduced , are  sanctioned  by  their  antiquity : their  other 
peculiarities  are  less  innocent,  and  have  prevailed  through  the 
evil  disposition  of  the  people  themselves.  The  Jews  have 
grown  into  a nation  by  the  agglomeration  of  the  worst  of 
men  from  all  quarters  ; and  dogged  as  is  their  fidelity , 
prompt  as  is  their  sympathy  towards  one  another , while 
towards  all  besides  they  exercise  the  hatred  of  avowed  ene- 
mies,— refusing  to  eat  or  intermarry  with  them,  however  li- 
centious in  their  connexions  among  themselves, — they  have 
appointed  circumcision  for  their  distinctive  bond  of  union. 
This  token  they  exact  of  all  who  adopt  their  religion,  and 
these  they  teach,  as  their  first  lesson,  to  despise  their  own  di- 
vinities, and  renounce  their  country,  their  kindred,  and  their 
friends.  They  are  careful,  however,  to  multiply  their  num- 
bers, and  count  it  a crime  to  put  their  kin  to  death : they  be- 
lieve, moreover,  that  the  souls  of  those  who  die  in  battle  or 
on  the  scaffold  are  immortal.  Hence  their  lust  of  begetting 
and  their  scorn  of  dying.  Like  the  Egyptians,  they  bury, 
and  do  not  burn  their  bodies,  and  take  the  same  interest  as 
the  Egyptians  in  preserving  them : for  both  hold  a like  be- 
lief about  the  dead,  though  their  ideas  of  divine  things  are 
directly  opposed.  For  the  Egyptians  adore  various  animals , 
and  their  visible  images  ; the  Jews  conceive  of  God  mentally, 
and  as  one  only.  Profane,  they  say,  are  those  who  fashion 
a figure  of  the  Deity  with  perishable  materials,  after  a human 
likeness : the  Deity  is  supreme  and  eternal,  nor  can  It  change, 
nor  Is  it  liable  to  perish.  Accordingly  they  suffer  no  images 
in  their  cities,  nor  even  in  their  temples.  They  concede  no 
such  flattery  to  kings,  no  such  compliments  to  Caesars.  But 
because  their  priests  played  on  pipes  and  timbrels,  and  wore 
ivy  garlands,  and  a golden  vine  was  found  in  their  temple , 
some  have  thought  that  Father  Bacchus,  the  conqueror  of  the 
East,  was  worshipped  by  them,  though  their  usage  bore  little 


A.  U.  822. J 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


445 


resemblance  to  his:  inasmuch  as  Bacchus  instituted  brilliant 
and  joyous  rites , but  the  ceremonial  of  the  Jews  is  pitiful  and 
sordid 

These  studied  insults  towards  a vanquished  enemy,  this 
ungenerous  perversion  of  facts  to  blast  his  character,  and  re- 
pel his  claims  to  justice  and  compassion,  must  is  the 

not  be  passed  over  without  notice.  The  author’s  the  loss 

determination  to  paint  the  rites  of  Judaism  in  coimt^the30" 
the  worst  colours,  so  different  from  the  light  in  war- 
which  his  countrymen  had  been  wont  to  regard  them,  is  not 
more  odious  than  his  insensibility  to  the  sublimity  of  its 
dogmas,  and  the  purity  of  its  moral  teaching.1 2  Whether  he 
echoed  the  ravings  of  popular  hostility,  or  enrolled  himself 
among  the  flatterers  of  the  Roman  court,  we  must  equally 
deny  him  a love  of  truth  and  concern  for  justice.  We  shall 
the  less  regret  the  chance  which  has  deprived  us  of  his  nar- 
rative of  the  Jewish  war,  in  which  the  absence  of  candour 
and  just  appreciation  of  the  enemy  was  no  doubt  ill  redeem- 
ed by  painting,  however  brilliant,  Tacitus,  it  may  be  feared, 
was  incapable  of  understanding  the  burning  zeal  and  solemn 
enthusiasm  which  marked  the  most  soul-stirring  struggle  of 
all  ancient  history. 

Whatever  was  the  moral  corruption  of  the  Jewish  people 
at  this  epoch,  however  deep  the  degeneracy  of  feeling  which 
blinded  them  to  the  spiritual  character  of  the  Vigour  of 
promises  already  fulfilled  among  them,  their  faith  sentiment^ 
in  the  national  creed  was  not  perhaps  then  less 


intense  than  in  the  days  of  their  purity  and  sim-  eP°ch- 
plicity.  Sufferings  had  cherished  and  not  extinguished  it ; for 
these  sufferings  had  -always  been  accompanied  with  hope, 
and  the  whole  genius  of  Judaism  was  fitted  to  keep  alive  the 
expectation  of  deliverance.  The  repetition,  day  by  day,  of 


1 Tac.  Hist.  v.  5. : “ Judaeorum  mos  absurdus  sordidusque.” 

2 It  may  be  remembered  that  Strabo’s  account  of  the  origin  and  teaching 
of  the  Jews  (xvi.  2.  p.  *761,  '762.)  is  far  more  dignified  and  candid  than  that  of 
Tacitus.  Thi3  later  change  of  sentiment  towards  them,  which  may  be  remark- 
ed also  in  the  tone  of  popular  literature  at  Rome,  is  well  worthy  of  notice. 


446 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


the  Psalms  and  Prophecies  charmed  away  the  advances  of 
despair  and  despondency.  Nor  can  we  doubt  that  the  con- 
centration of  their  faith  on  One  God  gave  peculiar  vigour  to 
the  religious  sentiment  among  them.  Monotheism  is  more 
enthusiastic  than  Polytheism : it  assures  men  of  a closer  con- 
nexion with  the  Deity  : it  may  rush  into  the  excesses  of  fa- 
talism or  fanaticism,  but  it  stands  a strain  of  temporal  dis- 
couragement which  would  break  asunder  all  the  bands  of 
idolatry  and  superstition.  No  polytheist  could  comprehend 
the  principles  which  animated  the  Jew  at  this  eventful  epoch ; 
least  of  all  a polytheist  of  the  Roman  aristocracy ; one  who 
had  renounced  all  vital  faith  himself,  and  trusted  in  no  high- 
er intelligence  than  his  own.  The  strength  of  this  people’s 
convictions  is  shown  by  their  stedfast  rejection  of  the  pre- 
tensions of  magic,  which  their  religion  strenuously  denounc- 
ed. Tacitus  himself  remarks  the  absence  among  them,  most 
strange  as  it  must  have  seemed  to  him,  of  those  expiatory 
rites  by  which  the  heathen  avowed  his  terrors  in  the  face  of 
prodigies  and  omens.  In  this  sturdy  abnegation  of  the  re- 
sources of  feebler  minds  he  might  have  discovered  the  gen- 
uine fervour  of  the  faith  which  animated  the  people  he  so 
ungenerously  calumniated.1 

There  is  another  point  of  view,  however,  which  the  hea- 
then philosopher  could  not  seize,  from  which  the  Christian 
must  regard  the  position  of  the  Jews.  Whether 

The  Jews  in  ° A . ..  . 

the  view  of  we  consider  their  sin  to  have  lam  m their  carnal 

Christians,  ju-  . . . 

diciaiiy  aban-  interpretation  oi  prophecy,  or  m their  reiection 

donedto  . * . , r .J’  i r 

their  selfish  oi  truth  and  godliness  m the  person  ot  Jesus 
Christ,  they  were  judicially  abandoned  to  their 
own  passions,  and  the  punishment  which  naturally  awaited 

1 Tac.  Hist.  y.  13. : “ Evenerant  prodigia,  quae  neque  hostiis  neque  votis 
piare  fas  habet  gens  superstitioni  obnoxia,  religionibus  adversa.”  Exception 
must  be  made  for  private  adventurers,  such  as  the  exorcists  in  Ads,  xix.  13. 
(comp.  Justin  Martyr,  c.  Tryph.  p.  311. ; etz opKiorcd  ry  Texyrj),  who  seem  to 
have  been  generally  Jews  resident  abroad.  A strange  passage  in  Pliny  (Hist. 
Hat.  xxx.  2.)  speaks  of  the  magic  of  the  Jews  at  Cyprus,  connecting  it,  by  a 
mere  conjecture  apparently,  with  Moses:  “Est  et  alia  magices  factio,  a Mose 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


447 


them.  Though  contending  for  a noble  principle,  as  apostles 
of  national  liberty,  the  Zealots  were  not  cordially  supported 
by  the  mass  of  their  own  people:  a large  majority  of  the 
Jews  would  doubtless  have  acquiesced,  however  reluctantly, 
in  the  Roman  dominion ; still  more  would  have  been  content 
to  temporize ; but  the  minority  were  the  fiercest  and  the 
strongest  in  will;  they  could  not  persuade  but  they  would 
not  yield,  and  they  enforced  their  determination  upon  the 
multitude  by  threats  and  violence.  The  Zealots  have  not 
inaptly  been  compared  with  the  Montagnards  of  the  French 
revolution,  driven  by  their  own  indomitable  passions  to  as- 
sert the  truths  which  possessed  them,  with  a ferocity  which 
no  possession  can  justify. 

The  reduction  of  Galilee  and  Persea  had  driven  numbers 
of  the  rural  population  within  the  walls  of  Jerusalem,  the 
only  stronghold  which  now  seemed  capable  of  Revolutionary 
protecting  them.  Among  the  rest,  John  of  Gis-  theZeaiS^ 
cala,  as  we  have  seen,  had  abandoned  the  defence  Jerusalem- 
of  his  native  city,  escaping  from  it  before  it  had  yet  fallen, 
and  had  thrown  himself  with  the  most  violent  of  his  parti- 
sans into  the  capital.  To  the  charge  of  cowardice  with 
which  the  opposite  faction,  ill-pleased  at  his  reappearance, 
assailed  him,  he  replied  that  it  was  necessary  to  concentrate 
the  forces  of  the  nation,  and  compel  the  enemy  to  come  to 
the  attack  of  the  impregnable  fortress  they  had  so  long 
shrunk  from.  But  this  influx  of  strangers,  scared  from  their 
judgment,  and  nothing  more  to  lose,  was  fatal  to  the  suprem- 
acy of  the  Moderate  party  in  the  city,  who  already  main- 
tained their  position  with  difficulty.  The  views  of  the  Zeal- 
ots were  not  directed  against  the  Romans  only : they  aimed 
at  a complete  revolution  in  the  government  at  home,  and  as 
long  as  the  invader  was  still  distant,  postponed  every  other 
care  to  an  intrigue  for  exterminating  their  rivals,  and  grasp- 
ing the  helm  of  state.  Under  the  guidance  of  the  daring 
demagogue,  Eleazar,  they  introduced  bands  of  ruffians  into 

, etiamnum  et  Lotapea  Judseis  pendens,  sed  multis  millibus  annorum  post  Zoro- 
astrem.  Tanto  recentior  est  Cypria .” 


448 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


the  city,  who  filled  the  streets  with  tumult  and  disorder,  and 
seized  the  person  of  Antipas,  a kinsman  of  Agrippa,  and  with 
him  a number  of  the  chief  nobility.  Apprehending  that 
they  should  not  be  able  to  retain  these  victims  in  custody, 
the  chiefs  of  the  faction  resolved  to  destroy  them  without 
form  of  trial,  and  pretending  that  they  were  in  communica- 
tion with  the  Romans,  introduced  a band  of  cutthroats  into 
the  prison,  and  put  most  of  them  to  the  sword.1  The  popu- 
lace, still  generally  attached  to  their  natural  leaders,  were 
cowed  by  the  audacity  of  the  act,  and  looked  on  with  passive 
amazement.  The  Zealots  proceeded  to  declare  the  vacancy 
of  some  priesthoods  appropriated  to  noble  families,  and  con- 
ferred them  on  obscure  creatures  of  their  own. 

Thus  insulted  and  menaced,  Ananus,  and  such  of  his  as- 
sociates as  had  escaped  assassination,  appealed  at  last  to  the 
people,  and  organized  the  friends  of  order,  in- 

They  massacre  A r.  * 

the  Moderate  eluding,  no  doubt,  some  secret  adherents  of  Rome, 

party,  and  as-  . . 

sume  the  gov-  against  the  terrorists,  as  a common  enemy.  The 
Zealots,  menaced  in  their  turn,  but  more  prompt 
and  audacious,  seized  the  strong  enclosure  of  the  Temple, 
and  established  themselves  within  it.  From  thence  they 
made  various  sallies  against  their  opponents  ; their  fanatical 
ardour  overmatched  the  better  discipline  of  the  state  militia  ; 
but  they  were  far  inferior  in  numbers,  and  were  still  confined, 
for  the  most  part,  to  their  defences,  while  Ananus,  though  he 
pushed  his  troops  within  their  outer  lines,  shrank  from  turn- 
ing his  arms  against  the  holy  place  in  which  they  sheltered 
themselves.  The  Zealots  were  utterly  unscrupulous.  They 
had  employed  assassination ; they  now  contemplated  massacre. 
They  treated  with  the  turbulent  banditti,  who,  expelled  from 
their  homes  in  the  southern  districts  of  Judea,  were  now 
roaming  the  country,  and  these,  twenty  thousand  in  number, 
rushed  to  the  gates  of  the  city,  which  they  found  closed 
against  them.  On  the  occurrence,  however,  of  a tremendous 
tempest,  which  threw  the  government  off  its  guard,  the  rev- 


1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  iv.  3.  6. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


449 


olutionists  contrived  to  introduce  them  within  the  walls,  and 
joining  with  them,  attacked  their  opponents  unawares  with 
murderous  effect.  Ananus  was  among  the  first  victims,  and 
with  him  fell  most  of  the  leaders  of  his  party.  Eleazar  and 
his  confederates  issued  in  triumph  from  their  fastness,  seized 
the  reins  of  government,  and  completed  the  carnage  of  the 
day  with  a series  of  judicial  executions.1  The  extreme  party 
now  reigned  unresisted  in  Jerusalem.  Jehovah,  they  pro- 
claimed, had  manifestly  declared  Himself  on  their  side. 
Judea  stood  once  more  erect  and  independent,  and  invited 
her  children  dispersed  throughout  the  world  to  fulfil,  by  a 
common  effort,  her  imperial  destiny.  But  in  Rome  they  had 
been  crushed;  in  Alexandria  they  were  baffled;  Hero  had 
cajoled  Yologesus,  and  engaged  him  to  control  their  move- 
ments in  Ctesiphon  and  Seleucia ; the  summons  of  the  pa- 
triots met,  it  seems,  with  no  response  beyond  the  confines  of 
Palestine,  and  the  army  of  Titus  confronted  in  closed  lists 
the  defenders  of  the  city  of  David. 

There  was  still  a short  interval  ere  the  eagles  were  ad- 
vanced in  sight,  and  th,e  abomination  of  desolation  stood  in 
the  Holy  Place.2  While  the  chiefs  of  the  Ro- 
man  army  were  occupied  with  manoeuvres  for  three  factions, 
securing  the  empire,  the  leaders  of  the  Jews  were  occupy  eci  y' 
actively  engaged  in  plotting  against  each  other.  The  Zeal- 
ots, in  the  moment  of  victory,  were  split  into  three  factions. 
Eleazar,  at  the  head  of  the  residents  of  Jerusalem,  still  held 
his  strong  position  in  the  inner  enclosure  of  the  Temple ; but 
John  of  Giscala,  who  had  refused  to  join  in  the  recent  mas- 
sacres, and  had  received  the  adhesion  of  a portion  of  the 
population,  now  shocked  and  remorseful  at  the  deeds  they 
had  committed,  succeeded  to  the  lodgment  of  Ananus  in  its 
outer  precincts.  Simon  Bargiora,  who  had  held  the  fortress 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  iv.  4. 

2 St.  Matt.  xxiv.  15. : pSelvyfm  ttjq  epij/i&creog.  See  Grotius in loc. : “Non 
dubito  fideTivypa  vocari  signa  Romanorum  militaria.”  The  rdirog  ayiog , or 
“ holy  place,”  according  to  the  same  interpreter,  includes  the  tract  of  country 
between  the  city  and  the  hills  which  stand  round  about  it 

yol.  vi. — 29 


450 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


of  Massada  on  the  Asphaltic  lake  during  the  late  campaigns, 
now  entered  the  city  with  a third  army,  and  posted  himself 
on  the  opposite  hill  of  Zion,  from  whence  he  conducted  the 
defence  of  the  common  ramparts.  John  and  Simon  might 
dispute  the  superiority  in  numbers  and  equipment ; but  the 
stronghold  of  Eleazar  was  regarded  by  the  Romans  as  the 
real  citadel  of  Jerusalem.  After  many  open  attacks  and  se- 
cret stratagems,  John  contrived  to  assassinate  this  powerful 
rival,  and  obtained  possession  of  the  whole  Temple  with  the 
eminence  on  which  it  stood.  Henceforth  the  contest  was 
narrowed  to  two  competitors,  who  consented  to  waive  hostil- 
ities only  on  the  approach  of  the  foreign  armies  to  their 
walls.1 

From  the  edge  of  the  high  country  which  intervenes  be- 
tween the  Mediterranean  and  the  Jordan  valley,  swells  out  a 
Topography  Of  broad  projection,  inclining  generally  to  the 
Jerusalem.  southward,  and  terminated  abruptly  by  deep 
converging  ravines.2  Before  plunging  into  these  hollows,  it 
rises  in  more  than  one  distinct  knoll,  and,  contrary  to  the 
usual  configuration  of  such  spurs  of  hills,  the  highest  of 
these  is  nearest  to  its  extremity.  This  conspicuous  eminence 
the  Jews,  at  least  after  their  return  from  the  Captivity,  dis- 
tinguished with  the  sacred  name  of  Zion.3  Here  they  pointed 

1 Tac.  Hist.  v.  12.:  “Tres  duces,  totidem  exercitus.  Extrema  et  latissima 
mcenia  Simo  ....  mediam  urbem  Joannes,  templum  Eleazarus  firmaverat. 
Multitudine  et  armis  Joannes  ac  Simo,  Eleazarus  loco  pollebat.”  Josephus  ex- 
plains their  positions  more  definitely.  Bell.  Jud.  v.  1. 

2 The  highest  elevation  of  this  tongue  of  land  is  said  to  be  2200  feet  above 
the  sea.  Mr.  Stanley  has  expressed  clearly  what  preceding  describers  had  failed 
to  signalize,  that  the  plateau  of  Jerusalem  is  generally  above  the  level  of  the 
surrounding  country.  Sinai  and  Palestine,  p.  169. 

3 Such  is  the  name  given  to  this  hill  in  modem  times,  in  conformity  with 
the  description  in  the  Book  of  Maccabees,  and  apparently  with  the  common 
usage  of  the  Jews  after  the  Captivity.  It  is  remarkable  that  the  name  is  never 
mentioned  by  Josephus  or  the  writers  of  the  New  Testament,  who  were  aware, 
perhaps,  that  its  application  was  erroneous,  and  that  the  original  Zion,  on  which 
stood  the  city  of  David,  was  the  opposite  height  of  the  Temple.  This  transpo- 
sition of  the  name  (see  Fergusson’s  Essay,  and  Thrupp’s  Ancient  Jerusalem) 
seems  to  furnish  an  important  key  to  the  topography  of  that  city.  I have  no 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


451 


out  the  reputed  tomb  of  their  favourite  sovereign  David ; 
here  was  the  royal  palace  of  Herod  described  with  such  en- 
thusiasm by  the  Jewish  historian,  around  which  clustered 
perhaps  the  mansions  of  the  nobles;  the  buildings  on  this 
summit  were  designated  as  the  Upper  City,  encircled  with  a 
wall  which  crowned  the  brow  of  the  hill.  Eastward  of 
Zion,  and  separated  from  it  by  a hollow,  now  scarcely  dis- 
tinguishable, called  the  Tyropceon,  or  cheesemarket,  rose 
another  eminence,  sloping  gradually  from  the  north  till  it 
dipped  into  the  valley  of  Jehoshaphat,  with  an  escarpment  of 
two  hundred  feet.1  The  Temple  of  J erusalem,  planted  nearly 
on  the  southern  extremity  of  this  second  hill,  was  completely 
overlooked  by  Zion,  and  also  by  the  fortress  Antonia,  with 
which  Herod  protected  it  on  its  northern  flank.  Beyond 
this  fortress  the  ground  still  rose  to  the  northward,  though 
lowered  to  some  extent  artificially,  and  received  the  name 
of  Acra  to  indicate  its  marked  elevation,  though  the  build- 
ings upon  it  were  denominated  the  Lower  City,  in  contradis- 
tinction from  the  Upper  City  of  Zion.3  Acra,  or  Moriah,  as 
it  has  been  called  by  a vulgar  error,  might  thus  represent 
the  Capitoline,  and  Zion  the  Palatine  at  Rome : the  depress- 
ion between  them,  crossed  by  a bridge  or  causeway,  was 
thronged  with  the  dwellings  of  the  lowest  classes,  and  occu- 
pied the  place  of  the  Velabrum  or  the  Suburra.  A second 

special  qualifications  myself  for  determining  the  merit  of  this  view,  on  which  a 
more  competent  witness,  Mr.  Stanley,  gives  no  decided  opinion.  {Sinai  and 
Palestine , p.  172.)  The  reader  will,  however,  expect  some  aid  in  following  my 
description,  and  I have  furnished  him  with  the  best  plan  I can  exhibit  of 
ancient  Jerusalem,  being  a slight  modification  of  Kiepert’s. 

1 Josephus  declares,  in  his  usual  spirit  of  exaggeration,  that  the  depth  of 
the  valley  beneath  the  eastern  front  of  the  Temple  was  400  cubits  or  600  feet. 
Antiq.  Jud.  xx.  8.  7. 

2 The  hill  of  Acra  .is  described  by  Josephus  as  a/Mp'iKvpToc , “gibbous,”  or 
“pointed  at  the  extremities  with  convex  sides,” — a word  which  is  applied  else- 
where to  the  moon  in  her  third  quarter ; it  represents  very  fairly  the  configura- 
tion of  the  hill,  popularly  called  Moriah,  on  which  the  Temple  stood.  Thrupp, 
p.  36.  Moriah,  according  to  this  author,  means  no  special  hill,  but  a certain 
hill-country.  See  p.  46. 


452 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


rampart,  issuing  from  the  northern  face  of  the  wall  of  Zion, 
and  after  running  northwards  some  hundreds  of  yards, 
sweeping  round  to  the  eastward  and  returning  along  the 
ridge  above  Jehoshaphat,  connected  the  two  hills  together 
with  a continuous  line  of  defences.  The  hill  of  Zion  was 
almost  a perfect  square : but  Acra,  more  oblong  in  shape, 
overlapped  it  considerably  to  the  northeast,  and  in  the  rec- 
tangle between  them,  a third  hill,  to  which  we  may  give  the 
name  of  Calvary,  rose  a little  lower  than  the  one,  and  as 
much  higher  than  the  other.  The  venerable  tradition  which 
assigns  this  spot  for  the  place  of  our  Lord’s  crucifixion,  and 
has  consecrated  it  with  the  existing  church  of  the  Holy  Sep- 
ulchre, may  be  accepted  with  reasonable  confidence.  At  the 
date  of  the  Crucifixion  it  stood  outside  the  walls ; but  Herod 
Agrippa  undertook  to  enclose  it,  together  with  a large  sub- 
urb to  the  north,  in  a third  line  of  defences.  Bezetha,  or  the 
New  City,  for  so  it  was  denominated,  embraced  an  area 
towards  the  north  and  north-east,  fully  equal  to  all  the  rest 
of  Jerusalem  together.  The  metropolis  of  Judaism  was  thus 
completed,  after  the  type  of  Antioch  or  Alexandria,  in  three 
several  quarters,  separated  from  each  other  by  distinct  walls, 
but  surrounded  by  an  exterior  fortification.  On  three  sides 
it  was  defended  by  deep  ravines,  and  its  ramparts  were  piled 
up  from  the  bottom,  or  elevated  on  the  brow  of  nearly  per- 
pendicular precipices ; but  its  northern  face  was  level  with 
the  country  beyond,  and  on  this,  the  only  accessible  quarter, 
the  attack  of  the  Assyrians,  in  ancient  times,  and  of  the  Ro- 
mans under  Pompeius,  had  been  directed.  The  works  of 
Agrippa  were  planned  on  a vast  scale,  to  strengthen  the  city 
on  its  vulnerable  side ; but  the  Romans  had  jealously  inter- 
fered. In  some  places  the  walls  had  scarcely  risen  from  their 
foundations  when  he  was  forbidden  to  proceed  with  them. 
But  they  had  been  carried  on  hastily  by  the  Sanhedrim  in 
the  first  years  of  the  insurrection,  and  the  fortifications  were 
completed,  though  not  perhaps  in  their  full  proportions,  when 
the  enemy  appeared  before  them.1 

1 Joseph.  Anliq.  Jud.  xix.  7.  2.,  Bell.  Jud.  v.  4. 2.  Tacitus  (Hist.  v.  12.)  says 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


453 


The  circuit  of  these  exterior  defences  may  have  measured 
about  four  miles,  and  the  ordinary  population  could  scarcely 
amount  to  200,000 ; but  this  number  was  vastly 

, . „ _ _ . _ . J Extent  and 

mcreased  on  occasion  of  the  great  festivals  when  population  of 
the  Jews  thronged  to  their  national  temple  from 
all  quarters.1  The  inroads  of  the  Romans  into  the  rural  dis- 
tricts of  Galilee,  Samaria,  and  Peraea  had  driven  vast  multi- 
tudes, as  we  have  seen,  to  the  capital  for  shelter,  and  as  the 
spring  of  the  year  advanced,  these  were  still  further  swelled 
by  the  influx  of  Paschal  worshippers.  Tacitus  estimates  at 
600,000  the  number  inclosed  within  the  walls  at  the  period 
of  the  siege ; and  this  estimate,  great  as  it  is  compared  with 
the  extent  of  accommodation,  is  far  less  than  what  we  might 
infer  from  certain  statements  . of  Josephus.2  Within  the 
rampart  of  this  triple  city  were  several  places  of  It8  citadel  ^ 
strength.  The  citadel  was  the  castle  Antonia,  towers- 
so  called  by  Herod  in  honour  of  his  patron  the  Triumvir. 
The  towers  Hippicus,  Phasaelus  and  Mariamne,  with  proba- 
bly some  others,  were  separate  fortresses  con- 
structed for  mutual  support.  The  Temple  itself, 
surrounded  by  an  outer  and  inner  wall,  was  capable  of  resist- 
ing very  formidable  attacks.  It  comprised  an  outer  court 
of  one  stade  or  600  feet  each  way,  lined  with  double  or  triple 
porticos,  and  within  this  an  inner  area,  subdivided  into  four 
compartments,  and  containing  the  shrine  without  an  idol, 
the  mysterious  Holy  of  Holies.  In  extent  and  the  grandeur 
of  its  proportions  as  well  as  in  decoration,  this  temple  far 


The  Temple. 


that  after  Agrippa’s  death  the  Sanhedrim  had  purchased  the  permission  or 
connivance  of  Claudius  for  continuing  the  work.  Thrupp,  Ancient  Jerusalem , 
p.  196. 

1 Josephus  estimates  the  extent  at  thirty-three  stades,  which  agrees  very 
closely  with  the  indications  of  the  ground.  See  the  Plan.  In  the  time  of 
Ptolemy  Lagus,  or  at  the  founding  of  Alexandria,  the  population  is  computed 
by  the  same  author  ( contr . Apion.  i.  22.)  at  120,000.  The  extent  had  doubled 
since  that  time ; but  some  allowance  should  be  made  for  his  habitual  exagger- 
ation. 

2 Eusebius  states  the  number  roundly  at  3,000,000  {Hist.  Eccl.  iii.  5.),  from 
a passage  in  Josephus,  which  will  be  referred  to  hereafter. 


454 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  69. 


exceeded  any  edifice  of  the  kind  in  Rome : the  outer  court 
of  the  Capitol  was  only  200  feet  square,  and  its  inner  cell  no 
doubt  proportionably  diminutive.  The  palace  of  the  kings 
of  Judea  I have  already  described  as  not  less  superior  in 
magnificence  to  the  abodes  of  Augustus  and  Tiberius.1  The 
whole  city,  upon  which  many  despots  had  lavished  their 
wealth,  as  far  surpassed  Rome,  at  least  before  Nero’s  resto- 
rations, in  grandeur,  as  it  fell  short  of  it  in  size  and  popula- 
tion. 

With  the  closing  days  of  the  year  69  the  empire  had 
been  won  for  the  Flavian  family,  and  its  chiefs  were  now  at 
leisure  to  direct  all  its  forces  against  the  two  for- 

Titus  conducts  . 1 1 ° . . 

an  army  eign  foes  who  had  so  long  profited  by  its  divis- 

againstJeru-  . ° . f , * 

saiem.  ions,  and  overwhelm  the  isolated  revolts  of  Caul 

a.d.  70.  and  Judea.  Yespasian,  preparing  to  seat  him- 

self on  the  throne  of  the  Caesars,  had  instructed 
his  son  to  open  his  fourth  campaign  with  the  investment  of 
Jerusalem,  every  outer  bulwark  of  which  had  been  success- 
ively reduced  by  the  operations  of  preceding  years.  Titus 
united  four  legions  in  this  service,  the  Fifth,  the  Tenth,  the 
Fifteenth,  which  were  previously  in  the  country,  and  the 
Twelfth  from  Syria,  to  which  were  added  detachments  of 
the  Third  and  Twenty-second  from  Alexandria.  Twenty 
cohorts  of  auxiliaries,  with  eight  squadrons  of  cavalry, 
swelled  his  ranks,  and  he  was  joined  by  the  contingents  of 
Agrippa,  Sohemus,  and  Antiochus  king  of  Commagene,  to- 
gether with  some  bands  of  Arabs,  between  whom  and  the 
Jews  there  existed  ancient  feuds.2  The  numbers  with  which 
Yespasian  had  commenced  the  struggle  have  been  com- 

1 The  principal  passages  in  Josephus  for  the  description  of  the  Temple  are 
Antiq.  Jud.  xv.  11.  3.  and  Bell  Jud.  v.  5.  Comp.  Tac.  Hist.  v.  12. : “ Templum 
in  modum  arcis  propriique  muri,  labore  et  opere  ante  alios : ipsae  porticus,  quis 
templum  ambiebatur,  egregium  propugnaculum.  Fons  perennis  aquae,  cavati 
sub  terra  montes ; et  piscinae  cisternaeque  servandis  imbribus : praeviderant  con- 
ditores,  ex  diversitate  morum,  crebra  bella.”  The  cisterns  and  subterranean 
galleries,  a marked  feature  of  the  spot,  are  described  by  all  the  topographers. 

2 Tac.  Hist  v.  1. ; Salvador,  ii.  385. 


A.  U.  822.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


455 


puted  at  60,000 ; it  seems  that  the  forces  now  led  by  Titus 
amounted  to  not  less  than  80,000.  To  these  the  Jews  op- 
posed, from  behind  -their  defences,  24,000  trained  and  well- 
armed  soldiers ; but  these  were  supported  by  a multitude  of 
irregular  combatants,  who  rushed,  at  every  emergency,  from 
the  lanes  and  closes  of  the  city,  to  man  the  walls  or  sally 
from  the  gates.1 

Titus,  advancing  from  the  north,  planted  his  camp  on  the 
ridge  called  Scopus,  from  whence  the  city  was  first  discov- 
ered to  the  view.2  The  Tenth  legion  was  de-  ^ 

° Operations  of 

tached  to  take  up  its  position  on  the  Mount  of  Titus  against 

. A A the  outer  wall, 

Olives,  to  prevent  escape  and  intercept  succour  which  is  at  last 
on  the  side  where  alone  they  were  to  be  appre- 
hended.3 But  the  Jews  did  not  allow  the  enemy  to  form  his 
lines  unmolested.  Some  bloody  combats  took  place  before 
the  defenders  of  Jerusalem  consented  to  retire  finally  within 
their  walls.4  Aware  of  the  strength  and  resolution  of  his 
opponents,  aware  also  that  he  had  three  distinct  lines  of 
rampart  to  force,  and  two  citadels  to  master,  the  Homan 
leader  prepared  to  conduct  the  siege  according  to  the  rules 
of  art,  with  the  patience  and  perseverance  not  less  requisite 
for  success  than  bravery.  It  was  necessary  to  advance  men 
under  cover  of  hurdles  and  extended  skins  to  fill  up  the 
ditch  with  fascines,  and  to  construct,  almost  in  contact  with 
the  walls,  huge  banks  of  earth,  supported  by  stones  and 
stakes,  till  they  reached  the  level  of  the  ramparts.  The  face 

1 Josephus  states  that  10,000  Jews  and  5000  Idumeans  placed  themselves 
under  the  orders  of  Simon ; the  remainder  of  the  24,000,  of  whom  3000  are 
specially  mentioned  as  the  Zealots  of  Eleazar,  were  attached  to  John  of  Giscala. 
Bell.  Jud.  v.  6.  1. 

2 Elevated  as  the  position  of  Jerusalem  is,  it  is  nevertheless  concealed  from 
the  traveller  till  within  a short  distance  by  an  almost  continuous  amphitheatre 
of  hills,  which  it  does  not  everywhere  overtop.  From  St.  Elias,  three  miles  to 
the  south,  from  Olivet,  or  Scopus,  it  bursts  upon  him  in  all  the  majesty  of  its 
throne-like  eminence.  Hence  the  proud  allusions  in  the  Psalms  and  Prophecies 
to  “the  hill,”  “ the  mountain,”  “ the  throne,”  “the  stronghold,”  of  Jehovah. 

3 Dion  (lxvi.  4.)  says  that  the  defenders  of  Jerusalem  received  succours 
from  their  brethren  beyond  the  Euphrates. 

4 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  v.  2.  4. ; Tac.  Hist.  v.  11. 


456 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  70. 


of  these  banks  was  as  nearly  as  possible  perpendicular ; they 
sloped  in  the  rear  to  afford  easy  ascent  to  the  assailants. 
They  were  crowned,  moreover,  with  towers,  from  which 
missiles  of  all  kinds  might  be  hurled  by  the  strength  of  men’s 
arms,  or  from  engines  adapted  for  the  purpose.1  Meanwhile 
the  skill  and  spirit  of  the  defenders  were  directed  to  over- 
throwing these  constructions  as  fast  as  they  were  erected, 
and  the  mass  of  wood  necessarily  employed  in  them  afforded 
aliment  for  fire.  A successful  sally  enabled  the  Jews  to  get 
in  the  rear  of  these  embankments,  to  attack  the  camp  of  the 
Romans,  and  destroy  the  munitions  of  war  laid  up  for  the 
service  of  the  siege.  The  assailants  were  obliged  to  resume 
their  operations  with  the  mine  and  the  battering-ram.  The 
chambers  they  excavated  beneath  the  walls  were  constantly 
countermined  by  the  defenders ; furious  combats  were  waged 
in  the  darkness,  and  the  miners  were  sometimes  confounded 
by  the  attack  of  wild  bears,  and  even  of  bees,  let  loose  in  the 
narrow  galleries  among  them.  The  attempts  to  board  the 
city  from  the  banks,  and  to  surprise  it  from  underground, 
having  equally  failed,  the  battering  engines  were  still  plied 
with  persevering  resolution ; stones  and  darts,  boiling  water 
and  oil,  were  in  vain  poured  down  upon  the  covering  which 
protected  the  assailants ; at  last  the  massive  wall  crumbled 
in  dust  before  them,  and  the  Romans  stood  triumphant 
within  the  outer  line  of  defences.2 

Since  the  entire  overthrow  of  the  moderate  faction  the 
affairs  of  the  Jews  had  been  conducted  with  far  greater  vig- 
our. The  chiefs  of  the  Zealots,  ably  seconded 

The  population  . / 

of  Jerusalem  by  their  creatures,  whom  they  had  installed  in 
the  resolution  all  places  of  trust  and  honour,  carried  everything 
of  the  zealots.  before  them.  Though,  while  the  Romans  were 

J Valerius  Flaccus,  in  tlie  invocation  of  his  poem,  gives  a picturesque  de- 
scription of  Titus : 

“ Solymo  nigrantem  pulvere  fratrem, 

Spargentemque  faces,  et  in  omni  turre  furentem.” 

He  was  wounded  in  the  left  shoulder,  and  his  hand  continued  weak  in  conse- 
quence. Dion.  lxvi.  5. 

2 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  v.  7.  2. 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


457 


still  distant,  they  had  continued  to  quarrel  among  them- 
selves, and  one  of  them  had  fallen  by  the  hands  of  a rival, 
from  the  first  appearance  of  the  enemy  before  the  walls  all 
private  contests  had  been  suspended,  and  the  operations  of 
the  defence,  bold,  skilful,  and  determined,  had  been  carried 
on,  at  every  gate  and  in  every  tower,  with  one  heart  and 
one  mind.  This  unanimity  in  action  was  effected  by  the  en- 
ergy rather  than  the  numerical  strength  of  the  dominant 
faction.  Among  the  multitudes  that  crowded  the  streets  of 
Jerusalem  many  no  doubt  were  eager  to  escape  from  their 
fears  and  sufferings  by  instant  submission ; sentiments  of 
honour,  patriotism,  and  even  religion  succumbed  before  the 
pangs  of  destitution  and  the  apprehension  of  approaching 
famine.  The  desperate  resolution  of  their  armed  defenders 
had  distressed  rather  than  animated  the  unarmed  populace. 
In  the  first  instance  Titus  had  attempted  conciliation.  He 
had  sent  Josephus  to  the  foot  of  the  gates  to  counsel  sub- 
mission, with  the  offer  of  honourable  terms.  But  the  chiefs 
of  the  army  had  not  suffered  him  to  be  heard ; they  had 
driven  him  with  bow-shots  from  the  wall.  When  the  Ro- 
mans after  six  weeks’  toil  found  themselves  still  before  the 
second  rampart  with  a second  and  again  a third  siege  in 
prospect,  they  determined  to  change  their  policy,  and  work 
on  the  fears  of  the  besieged.  They  threatened  to  reduce 
them  by  blockade.  Titus  drew  a line  of  circumvallation 
round  the  city,  at  a distance  of  one  or  two  fur-  The  Roman  cir- 
longs  from  the  walls,  which  was  completed  by  cumvallation- 
three  days’  continuous  labour  of  the  whole  army.1  The  dis- 
tress of  the  people,  cut  off  from  all  external  supply,  increased 
rapidly.  Multitudes  rushed  frantically  to  the  gates,  and 
flung  themselves  into  the  inclosed  space  without,  imploring 
permission  of  the  Romans  to  depart  into  the  country  without 
arms  or  baggage.  But  Titus  sternly  refused.  To  deter 
them  from  the  attempt and  teach  them  that  they  had  no 
hope  but  in  surrendering  the  city,  he  ordered  the  captives  to 


1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  v.  12.  2. 


458 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  70. 


be  suspended  on  crosses  round  the  walls,  and  continued  for 
several  days  to  inflict  this  cruel  punishment  upon  all  that 
fell  into  his  hands.1  The  fugitives  shrank  back  with  piteous 
cries  into  the  city,  but  their  murmurs  were  unavailing ; the 
chiefs  and  the  soldiers  maintained  their  dogged  resolution, 
and  in  the  midst  of  famine  and  pestilence,  and  the  wailings 
of  seers  and  prophets,  still  offered  the  daily  prayers  and  per- 
formed the  daily  sacrifice  in  the  Temple,  invoking  the  Lord 
of  Hosts  to  their  aid,  and  looking  for  the  promised  Messiah. 

The  Romans  continued  to  press  the  siege  with  repeated 
attacks  upon  the  second  wall  and  the  citadel  Antonia,  and 
Famine  and  suffered  many  serious  losses  : they  sent  Josephus 

portents.  again  and  again  in  vain,  to  induce  the  defenders 

to  capitulate ; but  they  trusted  more  in  the  effect  of  the 
blockade,  which  became  daily  more  distressing.  The  Zealots, 
regardless  of  the  sufferings  of  the  people,  made  rigid  perqui- 
sitions for  the  sustenance  of  their  soldiers,  and  great  was  the 
horror  which  pervaded  all  ranks  when  their  officers,  led  by 
the  scent  of  sodden  flesh  to  the  chamber  of  the  widow  Maria, 
discovered  in  her  dish  the  mangled  limbs  of  the  child  she 
had  murdered  for  her  meal.  At  an  earlier  period,  while  the 
Romans  were  still  admitted  within  the  city,  a crazy  enthusi- 
ast known  as  Joshua,  the  son  of  Hanan,  had  stalked,  as  one 
possessed,  through  the  public  places,  exclaiming,  Woe  to 
Jerusalem.  Rebuked  and  scourged  in  the  presence  of  the 
procurator,  he  had  refused  to  give  any  account  of  himself  or 
explain  the  meaning  of  his  ill-omened  cry  : checked  for  a 
season  he  now  resumed  it  more  vehemently  than  ever,  and 
continued  to  traverse  the  streets,  repeating,  A voice  of  ruin 
from  the  East  and  from  the  West , from  the  Worth  and  from 
the  South  ; a voice  of  ruin  against  the  City  and  against  the 
Temple , against  the  bride  and  the  bridegroom , and  against 
all  the  people ! Some  listened  to  him  with  pity,  some  with 

1 The  Romans  seemed  to  have  excused  these  atrocities  by  affirming  that  the 
fugitives  from  Jerusalem  poisoned  their  water  and  killed  their  stragglers.  Dion, 
lxvi.  5.  At  one  time  there  was  so  much  dejection  in  the  camp  of  the  besiegers 
that  many  of  them  deserted  and  took  refuge  in  the  besieged  city. 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


459 


fear ; some  thrust  an  alms  into  his  hand  ; others  scoffed  and 
menaced  him  ; but  none  ventured  to  punish  him.  Thus  he 
went  on  wailing  from  day  to  day : at  last  he  added  to  his 
list  of  woes,  Woe  to  me  also  ! At  the  same  instant  he  was 
stricken  with  a stone  from  a Roman  catapult,  and  fell  dead 
on  the  ground.1  The  city  was  filled  with  reports  of  the 
fearful  prodigies  which  were  now  remembered  to  have 
occurred  before  the  outbreak  of  the  present  troubles  ; of 
comets  and  meteors,  supposed  to  have  announced  the  ap- 
proaching downfall  of  the  nation  ; men  and  chariots  had 
battled  in  the  air ; the  gates  of  the  Temple  had  burst  open 
of  their  own  accord ; and  on  the  solemn  day  of  Pentecost  a 
voice  more  than  human  had  been  heard  exclaiming,  Let  us 
depart  hence  ! 3 

While,  however,  these  portents  struck  terror  into  the 
hearts  of  the  multitude,  bolder  spirits  were  not  wanting 
among  them,  who  consulted  no  omen  but  the 

. & „ 5 . . . The  Christians 

voice  of  patriotism,  and  maintained  that  the  retire  from  je- 

. . rusalem. 

nearer  rum  impended,  the  nearer  was  the  hour 
of  deliverance.  The  day  was  at  hand,  they  asserted,  the 
day  predicted  in  their  priestly  records,  when  the  East  should 
wax  in  power,  and  men  go  forth  from  Judea  to  rule  the 
world.  The  Romans,  listening  credulously  to  every  oracle, 
foreign  or  domestic,  pointed  with  exultation  to  Titus  and 
Vespasian,  who  issued  from  Judea  to  assume  the  government 
of  the  empire.  Josephus,  with  a remnant  of  national  feeling, 
or  regard  for  the  opinion  of  his  countrymen,  shrinks  from 
interpreting  the  prophecy  at  all.  The  Christians,  as  is  well 
known,  have  generally  inclined  to  see  in  it  an  allusion  to  the 
Messianic  visions  of  the  elder  prophets.3  Indeed  but  a few 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  vi.  5.  3. 

2 Tac.  Hist  v.  13. : “ Expassse  repente  delubri  fores,  et  audita  major  hu- 
mana  vox,  Excedere  Deos : simul  ingens  motus  excedentium.”  Comp.  Joseph. 
Bell.  Jud.  1.  c. : 'rrpurov  pkv  Kivrjoeug  avnlateadai  e<paoav  icai  ktvtzov , pera  de 
ravra  nai  <poxvi/c  aOpoag , perataivopev  kvrevdev.  It  is  remarkable  that  both  the 
Pagan  and  the  Jewish  writer  make  use  of  the  plural  number. 

3 Tac.  Hist.  1.  c. ; Suet.  Vesp.  4. ; Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  v.  4.,  who  thinks  fit  to 
disparage  the  prophecy  (probably  Daniel,  vii.  12,  15,  27,  28.):  to  kirapav 


460 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  70. 


weeks  before  a little  band  of  outcasts,  rich  in  faith,  but  bare 
of  this  world’s  goods,  had  gone  forth  from  Jerusalem  and 
Judea,  on  the  first  approach  of  the  Romans,  and  taken  refuge 
beyond  the  Jordan  in  Pella,  a village  of  the  Decapolis.1 
These  were  the  disciples  of  Jesus  Christ,  who  had  set  up 
their  church,  after  his  departure,  in  the  Jewish  capital,  and 
who  clung,  even  against  the  convictions  of  their  more  scat- 
tered brethren,  to  many  prejudices  of  their  ancient  faith. 
But  when  the  impending  fall  of  Jerusalem  opened  their  eyes 
to  the  Scriptures  which  were  written  for  their  warning,  they 
broke  the  last  bands  of  patriotism  and  superstition  which 
attached  them  to  the  Temple  and  the  Altar,  and  proclaimed 
themselves  missionaries  of  the  new  faith,  without  a backward 
glance  of  lingering  reminiscence.2  Then  it  might  be  said 
that  the  prophecy  was  spiritually  fulfilled  : the  preachers  of 
Christianity  went  forth  from  Judea  for  the  moral  conquest 
of  the  empire  and  the  world.  Much  as  we  may  admire  the 
enthusiasm  of  the  Jewish  patriots,  which  does  honour  to  our 
common  humanity,  still  more  freely  may  we  sympathize  with 
the  inspiration  of  these  soldiers  of  Christendom,  who  left 
father  and  mother,  home  and  country,  and  all  the  associations 
on  which  they  had  fed  from  infancy,  for  the  glory  of  God 
and  the  love  of  a spiritual  Redeemer. 

But  disease  and  slaughter  were  thinning  the  Jewish  ranks, 
and  their  numbers  diminished  even  faster  than  their  provis- 
ions. The  Romans  grew  impatient  of  the  delay. 

Titus  captures  ...  .......  . .. 

the  fortress  An-  Again  they  pushed  their  engines  to  the  walls, 
votes’ the  Jews  again  they  piled  embankments  against  them, 
to  capitulate.  agajn  they  mined  their  foundations  ; while  day 

avrovg  fialtara  ir pog  tov  nblepov  rjv  xpijo/ubg  a[i§'&okog,  k.  r.  X.  For  the 
Christian  interpretation  it  may  be  sufficient  to  refer  to  Paley  and  Lardner. 

1 Euseb.  Hist.  Heel  iii.  5. 

2 The  Christians  derived  their  warning  from  St.  Matt.  xxiv.  16.  and  St. 
Luke,  xxi.  21. : rdre  oi  ev  rrf  I ovdaia  ipeuyeruaav  elg  rd  bprj.  According  to  the 
modern  Jewish  view:  “Les  Chretiens  de  l’ecole  speciale  de  Josue  ou  Jesus  de 
Nazareth,  les  Chretiens-Nazareens,  se  degageaient  alors  du  systeme  d’expecta- 
tive  et  de  defense  particular  & la  loi  Juive : ils  se  transformaient  en  instrument 
organise  de  propagande  religieuse  et  morale,  de  conquete,  d’invasion.”  Salva- 
dor, ii.  23. 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


461 


by  day  the  obstinate  defenders  overthrew  their  works  and' 
baffled  their  approaches.  The  perseverance  with  which 
Titus  renewed  his  elaborate  constructions  after  every  failure 
was  not  less  eminent  than  the  fortitude  of  John  and  Simon. 
After  every  resource  of  skill  had  failed,  Antonia  was  at  last 
carried  by  surprise,  and  the  Romans  occupied  the  post  which 
overlooked  the  Temple.1  The  siege  had  already  lasted  three 
months.  Seven  days  were  now  employed  in  the  destruction 
of  the  citadel,  one  wing  only  being  reserved  as  a watch  tower. 
All  the  buildings  round  it  were  thrown  down  to  make  room 
for  the  works  required  for  the  attack  on  the  Temple,  and  the 
Lower  City  was  at  the  same  time  demolished.  Titus  had 
now  relaxed  from  his  earlier  severity.  Large  numbers  of  the 
population  received  their  lives  on  submission,  while  the  more 
desperate  fled  for  refuge  to  the  Temple  and  to  Mount  Zion. 
He  continued  to  press  offers  of  accommodation  on  the  rem- 
nant of  the  defenders ; but  these  were  still  met  with  unabated 
defiance.  Once  more  was  Josephus  put  forward  to  confer 
with  the  people  on  the  wall,  and  entreat  them  to  spare  the 
holy  place.  He  addressed  them,  like  the  Assyrian  of  old,  in 
the  Hebrew  language,  that  all  might  understand  him ; but 
John,  perceiving  (so  at  least  Josephus  assures  us)  the  im- 
pressing he  was  making,  sternly  interrupted  him,  declaring 
that  they  had  nought  to  fear,  for  Jerusalem  was  the  Lord’s, 
and  the  Lord  would  protect  it.2 

But  Josephus,  it  might  be  imagined,  was  reputed  a trai- 
tor, and  was  personally  odious.  The  representations  of  the 
captives  of  the  Lower  City,  now  admitted  to 

r . . .iTTi  The  Zealots  re- 

terms by  their  conquerors,  might  possibly  be  less  fuse  to  hearken 

obnoxious.  Accordingly,  a number  of  these 
people  were  ranged  before  the  gates  of  the  Temple  and  in- 
structed to  adjure  their  compatriots,  with  tears  and  prayers, 
to  yield  to  a clement  foe,  and  spare  the  cherished  shrine  of 

1 Joseph.  Bell  Jud.  vi.  1.  7.  Antonia  was  taken  on  the  seventeenth  of  Pane- 
mus,  i.  e.  the  beginning  of  July. 

a Joseph,  vi.  2.  1. : d>e  ov/c  av  wore  decceiev  akuciv,  Qeov  yap  V7rapxeiv  tjjv 
ir6%lV. 


462 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  70. 


Jehovah  from  the  ruin  which  must  inevitably  befall  it.  But 
the  Zealots  were  obdurate.  They  erected  their  engines  on 
the  gate  itself  and  poured  from  thence  a shower  of  stones 
and  darts,  which  strewed  the  terrace  in  front  with  bodies  of 
their  own  countrymen,  as  thick  as  a cemetery r The  defend- 
ers of  Jerusalem  had  now,  in  their  despair,  lost  all  respect 
for  sacred  things,  as  well  as  tenderness  for  their  kindred. 
They  flung  open  the  recesses  of  the  Temple,  and  carried  on 
their  operations  regardless  of  religious  usage,  profaning  the 
Holy  of  Holies  with  their  unhallowed  presence,  and  pollut- 
ing with  bloodstained  hands  the  golden  vines  and  the  gold- 
en table.1 2 

The  demolition  of  Antonia  and  its  outer  bulwarks  had 
cleared  the  space  required  for  works  against  the  northern 

wall  of  the  Temple,  its  position  rendering  it  on 

Operations  di-  . * . . 

rected  against  every  other  side  inaccessible.  Taking  his  stand 

the  Temple.  t . . „ , _ ® _. 

on  the  remaining  turret  of  the  fortress,  Titus, 
having  in  vain  expostulated  with  his  opponents,  and  declar- 
ed that  he  would  save  their  holy  place  even  in  their  own  de- 
spite, directed  the  operations  of  his  engineers,  and  gave  the 
signal  for  assault.  But  his  materials,  often  consumed  and  as 
often  replaced,  were  now  less  abundant,  and  had  to  be  drawn 
from  a greater  distance : if  the  defences  of  the  Temple  were 
less  formidable  than  those  of  the  outer  city,  the  works  ad- 
vanced against  them  were  perhaps  proportionally  slender : 
if  the  assailants  were  encouraged  by  success,  the  defenders 
were  maddened  by  despair,  and  baffled  all  their  attacks  with 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  vi.  2,  3.  Such  is  the  comparison  of  our  author : tig  to 
KVK?iCi  fiev  lepov  ano  ir'krjdovg  venp&v  KpoceoiKevcu  Tcohvavdp'up : such  a cemetery, 
I suppose  he  means,  as  the  places  in  which  the  bodies  of  slaves  and  strangers 
were  exposed  or  imperfectly  buried,  as  in  the  valley  of  Jehoshaphat,  and  the 
Esquiline  field  at  Rome. 

2 Joseph.  1.  c. ; rolg  6’  ayioig  ml  abaroig  pera  tcjv  oirluv  eloeTrf/dov,  deppag 
bn  rag  x£LPaG  £%  opotyvhuv  exovreg  <pbvov.  The  warmth  of  Josephus  must  be 
accepted  with  due  qualification.  The  golden  table  and  the  enormous  vines  of 
the  same  metal  are  mentioned  by  Josephus  (Bell.  Jud.  v.  5.  4.),  among  the 
most  splendid  objects  within  the  Temple,  after  it  had  lost  the  Ark,  the  Mercy 
Seat,  the  Urim  and  Thummim  and  the  Shechinah. 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


463 


unfailing  resolution.  Sometimes  the  Jews  sallied  from  their 
strongholds  and  even  crossed  the  vale  of  Kedron  on  their 
right,  and  dashed  themselves  in  vain  against  the  Roman  cir- 
cumvallation ; again  the  Romans,  in  the  darkness  of  the 
night,  scaled  the  low  rampart  of  the  Temple,  and  effected  a 
lodgment  for  a moment,  only  to  he  driven  from  it  headlong, 
when  the  dawn  revealed  them  to  their  enemies.  On  one  oc- 
casion the  defenders  purposely  evacuated  the  western  gallery 
of  their  outer  court,  and  allowed  the  Romans  to  climb  into 
it.  The  stone  pillars  were  surmounted  with  wooden  beams 
and  rafters,  and  in  the  space  between  these  and  the  roof  they 
had  piled  a mass  of  combustibles,  to  which  they  now  set 
fire,  and  consumed,  along  with  the  portico  itself,  a great 
number  of  their  assailants.1  But  as  the  defence  of  the  outer 
wall  relaxed,  the  missiles  of  the  besiegers  became  more 
effective.  They  continued  to  cast  their  brands  into  the  in- 
closure ; care  was  no  longer  taken  to  extinguish  them  as  they 
fell,  and  at  length  the  range  of  the  northern  portico,  roofed 
also  with  wood,  was  wrapped  in  flames.  It  was  now  im- 
possible to  maintain  the  outer  ramparts.  John  and  Simon, 
with  the  best  equipped  of  their  followers,  withdrew  alto- 
gether from  the  Temple,  and  sought  refuge  in  the  Upper 
City,  while  retreat  was  still  open.  They  crossed  the  con- 
necting causeway,  and  then  broke  it  down  behind  them. 
But  the  priests,  the  women,  and  the  unarmed  multitude  paid 
no  heed  to  this  desertion.  The  flames  which  raged  on  two 
sides  of  the  holy  place  seemed  to  their  wild  fanaticism  a 
barrier  set  by  God  between  Himself  and  the  enemy.  They 
crowded  with  frantic  devotion  within  the  second  enclosure, 
and  awaited  their  deliverance  in  grim  security.  Meanwhile 
Titus  advanced  his  engines  to  the  outer  wall ; but  the 
strength  of  its  compact  masonry  still  defied  the  battering- 
rams.  He  undermined  the  gates ; his  engines  shook  then- 
sustaining  bulwarks ; but  though  the  surface  crumbled,  the 
mass  stood  firm,  and  barred  ingress.  He  applied  ladders, 


1 Joseph.  Bell  Jud.  vi.  3.  1. 


464 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  70. 


and  the  Romans  mounted  without  opposition.  On  the  sum- 
mit they  were  met  by  a remnant  of  defenders,  who  still,  in 
the  fury  of  their  despair,  found  strength  to  hurl  them  head- 
long. Finally,  the  assailants  brought  fire  to  the  gates,  and, 
meeting  again  with  no  resistance,  succeeded  in  melting  the 
silver  plates  which  cased  them,  and  kindling  the  wood  be- 
neath. The  flames  now  cleared  the  way  for  their  advance, 
and  swept  from  pillar  to  pillar,  till  they  enveloped  all  that 
was  yet  standing  of  the  interior  porticos.  The  royal  porch 
of  Herod,  with  its  double  aisles  and  central  nave,  the  noblest 
feature  of  the  Temple,  now  blazed  from  end  to  end.1 
Hundreds  of  the  Jews  perished  in  this  storm  of  fire.  Titus 
called  his  chiefs  together,  and  deliberated  on  the  fate  of  the 
sanctuary.  Destroy  it  utterly , exclaimed  some ; retain  it  for 
ransom , suggested  others ; but  Titus  himself,  so  at  least  we 
are  assured  by  his  panegyrist,  was  anxious  at  all  events  to 
save  it.  Perhaps  he  regarded  it  as  a trophy  of  victory; 
possibly  he  had  imbibed  in  his  Eastern  service  some  rever- 
ence for  the  mysteries  it  enshrined ; and  even  the  fortunes 
of  his  family  disposed  him  to  superstition.2  He  ordered  the 
flames  to  be  quenched ; but  while  his  soldiers  were  employed 
in  checking  them,  the  Jews  sallied  from  their  inner  strong- 
hold ; a last  struggle  ensued.  Titus  swept  the  foe  from  the 
court  with  a charge  of  cavalry,  and,  as  they  shut  the  gates 
behind  them,  a Roman,  climbing  on  his  comrades’  shoulders, 
flung  a blazing  brand  through  a laticed  opening.  The  flames 
shot  up  ; the  Jews  shrank,  shrieking  and  yelling,  from  their 
parapets.  Titus,  roused  from  sleep,  to  which  he  had  for  a 
moment  betaken  himself,  commanded  or  implored  his  men  to 
save  their  glorious  conquest.  But  his  voice  was  drowned  in 
the  tumult ; his  gestures  were  disregarded ; the  soldiers 
burst  the  gates  or  scaled  the  walls,  and  rushed  in  headlong, 
trampling  in  their  frenzy  upon  one  another,  and  hewing 
themselves  a way  through  the  shattered  masses  of  the  enemy. 

1 For  the  description  of  this  southern  portico,  see  Joseph.  Antiq.  xv.  11.  3. 
with  Mr.  Fergusson’s  explanation.  Thrupp,  p.  322. 

2 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  vi.  4.  3. 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


465 


The  stair  of  the  Holy  Place  ran  with  torrents  of  blood,  over 
which  rolled  the  bodies  of  the  dead ; but  the  women  and 
children,  the  old  and  helpless,  had  collected  around  the  altar 
above  it,  and  there  was  consummated  the  sacrifice,  the 
bloodiest  and  the  last  of  the  Ancient  Covenant.  Through 
the  flames  and  smoke,  over  the  dead  and  dying,  Titus  forced 
his  way  into  the  Holy  of  the  Holies,  and  gazed 

j v * o ^Titns  enters 

for  a moment  on  the  wonders,  so  vaunted  by  the  g^Hoiy  of 
Jews,  so  disparaged  by  the  Gentiles,  which 
neither  Gentile  nor  Jew,  the  high  priest  alone  excepted,  was 
ever  suffered  to  look  upon.1  Here  the  fire  had  not  yet  pene- 
trated. He  rushed  forth  to  provide  for  its  protection,  urging 
his  men,  with  words,  and  even  with  blows,  to  stay  the  ad- 
vancing surges.  But  their  fury  was  deaf,  their  cupidity  was 
insensible ; they  had  caught  sight  of  gates  plated  with  silver, 
windows  lined  with  gold;  the  sanctuary,  they  had  heard, 
was  filled  with  unimaginable  riches,  and  they  feared  to  be 
baulked  of  their  plunder.  While  their  chief  was  still  parley- 
ing with  them,  a soldier,  who  had  pushed  within  the  veil 
beside  him  and  remained  behind,  applied  a torch  to  the  door, 
and  enveloped  the  place  in  flames.  Titus  looked  Conflagration 
back  with  a sigh,  but  made  no  further  attempts  of  the  Temple 
to  save  it.  He  withdrew  despondingly  from  the  spot,  and 
the  divine  decree  was  accomplished.2 

The  Jewish  chronicler  exhausts  all  his  rhetoric  in  describ- 
ing the  horrors  of  the  scene  he  had  himself  witnessed  from 
the  camp  of  the  victors.  The  hill  of  the  Temple 

. 1 The  Zealots 

was  enveloped  m a sheet  of  flame,  and  the  whole  defend  the  Up- 
city  seemed  to  be  involved  in  a general  confla-  per  Clt7’ 
gration.  The  shouts  of  the  conquerors,  the  shrieks  of  the 
victims,  the  groans  and  howls  of  a nation  of  spectators  in  the 
streets  and  on  the  hills  surrounding  Jerusalem,  surpassed  all 


1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  vi.  4.  6. : ttoXv  [iev  tt}q  tt apa  rolg  ahhoipvtot  (pr/pqc 
a/ieivu , tov  6e  k6[ittov  kcu  rrjq  tz apa  roig  o'ikeloiq  66^tjq  ovk  hlarru. 

2 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  vi.  4.  V.  It  will  be  seen  that  the  most  important  treas- 
ures of  the  sanctuary  had  been  previously  removed  by  the  priests,  and  fell  after- 
wards into  the  hands  of  the  conqueror. 

VOL.  vi. — 30 


466 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  70. 


horrors  recorded  or  imagined.  The  chiefs,  deluding  their 
followers  to  the  last,  had  contrived,  as  we  have  seen,  to 
escape  the  holocaust  in  the  Temple.  Behind  the  walls  of  the 
Upper  City  they  stood  again,  however  hopelessly,  at  bay. 
But  their  ramparts  were  strong,  and  to  the  north,  where 
alone  the  nature  of  the  ground  rendered  siege  operations 
possible,  a deep  and  broad  ditch  was  excavated  in  the  rock 
before  them.  Titus  received  the  acclamations  of  his  soldiers, 
who  saluted  him  as  imperator.  He  planted  his  standards  at 
the  eastern  portal  of  the  Temple,  which  was  still  standing, 
and  performed  his  sacrifices  before  them ; this  done,  he  re- 
sumed his  tedious  work  with  admirable  patience.  Once 
more  he  charged  Josephus  to  summon  the  malignants.  The 
renegade  was  dismissed  a last  time  without  a hearing.  He 
came  forward  in  person  to  the  chasm  in  the  bridge,  and  the 
Jewish  chiefs  conferred  with  him  from  the  other  side.  The 
Homan  addressed  them  as  an  injured  yet  placable  master. 
He  offered  life  to  such  as  should  lay  down  their  arms  and 
acknowledge  his  authority.  To  such  as  persisted  in  their 
crime  he  threatened  merciless  punishment.  The  Zealots  re- 
plied that  they  had  sworn  an  oath  never  to  surrender : let 
them  pass  freely  through  the  gates  with  their  wives  and 
children,  and  they  would  abandon  their  city  and  betake 
themselves  to  the  wilderness.  Well  indeed  might  they  dis- 
trust their  conqueror.  A few  unarmed  priests,  who  had 
cowered  among  the  ruins  of  the  Temple,  had  just  before 
descended,  pressed  by  hunger,  and  thrown  themselves  on  his 
mercy;  they  had  been  led  straightway  to  execution,  with 
the  brutal  sarcasm  that  those  who  live  by  the  altar  should 
perish  with  the  altar.1  On  this  refusal  of  the  insurgents  the 
imperator  declared  that  the  whole  city  should  be  razed  to 
the  ground,  and  began  at  once,  in  the  quarters  he  held,  the 
work  of  demolition. 

But  while  preparations  were  making  in  the  Roman  quar- 
ters for  the  reduction  of  the  last  stronghold  of  the  Jews,  the 


1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  vi.  6.  1. 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


467 


defenders  themselves  had  broken  through  all  re-  Dissolution  of 
straints  of  discipline,  and  the  Upper  City  was  cf^Se  among 
abandoned  to  rapine  and  slaughter.  Jealousy  the  Jews- 
and  discord  reigned  among  the  Jews ; their  chiefs  surren- 
dered to  them  every  obnoxious  citizen ; and  thousands  were 
impelled  to  throw  themselves  into  the  hands  of  the  enemy, 
who  granted  them  for  the  most  part  life  and  liberty.  An 
armed  band  seized  the  palace,  repulsed  an  attack  of  the  Ro- 
mans, put  to  the  sword  the  multitudes  who  had  taken  refuge 
in  it,  to  the  number,  as  we  are  told,  of  four  thousand,  and 
divided  among  themselves  the  treasures  which  had  been 
lodged  there.  One  Roman  prisoner  they  slew,  and  dragged 
his  body  through  the  streets  in  impotent  revenge  for  their 
own  slaughtered  myriads  ; another  they  bound  for  execution 
in  the  face  of  his  countrymen,  but  he  contrived  to  escape 
from  their  hands,  and  reached  the  Roman  lines.  It  was  re- 
ported, as  an  instance  of  the  sternness  of  the  general’s  disci- 
pline, tempered  by  his  personal  clemency,  that  though  he 
refrained  from  smiting  with  the  axe  the  soldier  who  had 
suffered  himself  to  be  captured,  he  deprived  him  of  his  arms, 
and  discharged  him  with  ignominy  from  the  service.1 

But  famine  at  last  was  doing  the  work  of  the  besiegers, 
more  surely  than  the  sword  or  the  catapult.  The  blockade 
was  strictly  kept ; provisions  failed  ; the  armed  ^ . 

J r 7 r 7 Famine,  mas- 

slew  the  unarmed  to  diminish  the  number  of  sacres,  and  re- 

. treat  into  the 

mouths,  but  their  own  strength  no  longer  sufficed  vaults  beneath 
for  a last  attempt  to  break  the  lines  of  circum-  the  Clty’ 
vallation.  A gleam  of  hope  still  flickered  in  their  bosoms. 
The  limestone  hills  of  Judea  are  perforated  with  numerous 
caves  and  fissures,  and  the  site  of  Jerusalem  itself  is  mined 
with  vaults  and  galleries,  excavated  by  the  hand  of  man. 
Here  were  the  storehouses  and  granaries,  the  reservoirs  and 
the  sewers  of  the  great  city ; narrow  and  winding  passages 
led  from  hill  to  hill,  from  building  to  building  beneath  the 
walls,  and  into  the  valleys  beyond  them.  It  seemed  possible  ' 


Joseph,  vi.  7.  1. 


468 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  70. 


to  find  here  a means  of  exit ; the  labyrinth  might  at  least 
afford  an  impenetrable  hiding-place.  John  and  Simon  with- 
drew from  the  defences  of  the  ramparts,  and  repaired  with 
the  most  desperate  of  their  followers  to  these  subterranean 
retreats,  while  the  Romans  occupied  the  strongholds  they 
had  abandoned,  and  carried  fire  and  slaughter  through  the 
streets  of  the  Tipper  City.  Overtaking  the  crowd  of  fugi- 
tives, fleeing,  yet  with  no  asylum  to  flee  to,  in  these  narrow 
avenues,  they  slew  till  they  were  weary  of  slaughter ; then 
broke  into  the  houses  and  loaded  themselves  with  plunder 
till  they  could  carry  off  no  more.  In  some  dwellings  they 
discovered  the  bodies  of  whole  families  huddled  together : 
hunger  had  anticipated  the  sword.  From  such  places  the 
fiercest  warriors  recoiled  with  horror,  and  rushed  back  into 
the  streets  empty-handed.1 2 

The  Upper  City  perished  in  the  flames,  like  the  quarters 
which  had  been  captured  before.  On  the  8th  of  Gorpiaeus, 

Destruction  of  aPParentty  an  early  day  in  September,  five 
the  upper  city  months  and  a half  after  the  first  investment,  Je- 

by  the  Romans.  , . . , . , „ _ , 

rusalem  ceased  to  exist,  litus  himsell  advanced 
step  by  step  through  the  blazing  ruins,  admiring  the  vast 
strength  of  the  defences,  the  solidity  of  the  towers,  the  size 
of  the  stones,  and  the  nice  adjustment  of  the  masonry.3 
God  has  been  my  helper , he  devoutly  exclaimed, — unless, 
indeed,  the  words  were  ascribed  to  him  by  the  uneasy  con- 
science of  the  renegade, — God  it  was  that  pulled  down  the 
Jews  from  those  formidable  walls  ; for  what  could  the  hands 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  vi.  8.  5. 

2 Dion  (lxvi.  7.)  asserts  that  Jerusalem  was  taken  on  the  Sabbath  day.  He 
had  said  the  same  of  its  capture  by  Pompeius,  and  again  by  Sosius.  Josephus, 
who  would  not  have  passed  over  such  a coincidence,  makes  no  mention  of  it. 
Norisius,  who  fixes  the  date  to  Sept.  2.,  proves  that  this  was  not  the  Sabbath. 

3 At  the  bottom  of  the  hills  in  some  places,  particularly  below  the  area  of 
the  temple,  there  may  now  be  seen  some  courses  of  stones  of  immense  propor- 
tions, bevelled  (that  is,  the  junction  between  them  grooved  to  some  depth),  giv- 
ing a great  appearance  of  solidity.  It  seems  possible  that  these  may  be  re- 
mains of  the  walls  which  Titus  admired,  and  which  Josephus  signalized  for 
their  anplteia  rfjg  appoviag , vi.  9.  1. 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


469 


of  men  or  their  engines  have  availed  against  them  ! While 
he  gave  orders  for  the  complete  destruction  of  the  strong- 
hold which  had  made  so  memorable  a resistance  to  the  forces 
of  the  empire,  he  directed  that  three  of  its  towers  should 
be  allowed  to  stand  as  a monument  of  its  strength,  and  of 
his  perseverance.1 2  With  the  same  deliberation,  and  on  simi- 
lar principles,  he  proceeded  to  deal  with  the  multitudes, 
who,  after  the  fury  of  the  victors  was  satiated,  still  remained 
to  glut  their  pride  or  their  cupidity.  He  decreed  that  those 
only  who  were  found  in  arms  and  resisting  should  hence- 
forth be  slain ; all  who  sued  for  quarter  should  be  spared, 
collected  together,  and  numbered.  Tet  when  the  tale  was 
completed,  the  old  and  useless  were  passed  in  cold  blood  on 
the  edge  of  the  sword.  The  tallest  and  best  looking  were 
next  chosen  to  grace  the  conqueror’s  triumph ; of  the  rest 
all  above  the  age  of  seventeen  were  drafted  off  to  the  quar- 
ries in  Egypt,  or  condemned  to  fight  with  beasts  in  the  thea- 
tres of  Antioch  and  Caesarea.  All  the  children  were  sold  as 
slaves.  But  the  fierce  animosity  of  the  soldiers  outran  the 
barbarity  of  their  officers,  and  was  met  with  equal  exaspera- 
tion on  the  part  of  the  victims.  Of  the  whole  number, 
eleven  thousand  if  we  may  believe  the  most  terrible  story  in 
Josephus,  perished  from  starvation,  some  denied  aliment  by 
their  keepers,  others  refusing  to  accept  it.3 

1 The  bases  of  the  towers  Hippicus  and  Phasael  are  believed  by  many  topog- 
raphers still  to  exist  at  the  foot  of  certain  turrets  of  the  modem  citadel  of  Jeru- 
salem. Williams,  art.  Jerusalem , in  Did.  Class.  Geography. 

2 Joseph,  vi.  9.  2. : £<pddpi]oav  & aiirdxv  ev  aig  dieicpivev  ryiepaig  vir  kvdeiag 
XlKiol  irpog  roig  yvpioig , ol  pev  vuo  piaovg  tuv  <pv?cdicov  prj  peralapSavovreg 
Tpotpjjg,  oi  6’  ov  Trpoaiepevoi  didopevrjv.  According  to  this  author  90,000  Jews 
were  made  captives  in  the  course  of  the  whole  war,  a number  which  seems  by  no 
means  excessive.  But  I cannot  persuade  myself  to  place  in  my  text  his  enu- 
meration of  the  victims  of  the  siege,  which  he  makes  to  amount  to  1,100,000. 
This  estimate,  he  adds,  will  not  appear  extravagant  when  we  remember  that 
the  multitudes  which  flocked  to  Jerusalem  for  the  passover  were  shut  up  in  the 
city,  and  that  the  priests,  when  interrogated  by  Cestius  about  the  number  of 
their  people,  had  calculated  the  number  of  Paschal  lambs  in  a given  year  at 

256,500,  and  the  number  of  communicants,  at  little  more  than  ten  to  each,  at 


470 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  70. 


Fierce  and  cruel  as  the  leaders  of  the  Jewish  patriots  had 
proved  themselves,  we  could  nevertheless  have  wished  to 
learn  that  they  too  fell  at  last,  sword  in  hand,  on 
the  last  tower  or  behind  the  last  breastwork  of  John  and  Si- 
their  city.  But  both  Simon  and  John,  as  we  m°n‘ 
have  seen,  had  sought  escape,  or  at  least  concealment,  in  its 
underground  galleries;  nor  were  they  successful.  John, 
pressed  by  hunger,  came  presently  forth  and  surrendered 
himself  openly  to  the  conqueror.  Simon  had  taken  with  him 
tools  and  workmen,  as  well  as  food,  and  laboured  to  exca- 
vate a passage  till  his  supplies  failed  him.  He  then  thought, 
in  his  last  extremity,  to  impose  upon  the  Romans  by  contriv- 
ing to  rise  arrayed  magnificently  in  white  or  purple  from  the 
centre  of  the  Temple  platform.  The  awe  or  terror  of  the 
spectators  soon  abated  when  they  saw,  beneath  the  royal  or 
priestly  robes,  the  squalid  features  of  their  victim.  Detected 
by  a Roman  officer,  he  was  led  bound  to  Titus.  Both  to  the 
Romans  and  to  his  countryman  J osephus  he  seems  to  have 
been  more  particularly  obnoxious  than  his  colleague.  While 
John  was  granted  his  life,  and  kept  without  public  disgrace 
in  perpetual  confinement,  Simon  was  reserved  for  the  special 
ornament  of  the  triumph,  for  ignominy,  and  for  death.1 

This,  says  the  historian,  was  the  sixth  time  that  the  J ew- 
ish  capital  had  been  captured,  the  second  time  that  it  had 
Conclusion  of  ^een  destroyed.  When  it  rose  again  from  its 
the  war.  ashes,  it  was  by  the  hands,  not  of  its  own  peo- 

ple, but  of  Roman  colonists ; and  many  are  the  generations 
which  have  since  witnessed  a siege  and  a sack  of  Jerusalem.2 
Of  the  remainder  of  this  war,  which  this  signal  blow  did  not 
immediately  terminate,  there  needs  little  be  said.  The  Jews 

2,700,000.  vi.  9.  3.  Comp.  Euseb.iKs*.  Eccl.  iii.  5.  The  physical  impossibility 
of  such  numbers  being  accommodated  within  the  area  of  the  city  has  been  often 
demonstrated. 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  vii.  2. 

2 Jerusalem  is  said  to  have  been  taken  seventeen  times  in  all, — sometimes, 
as  under  the  Persian  Chosru  and  the  Crusaders,  with  terrible  slaughter ; but  it 
has  been  overthrown  only  by  Nebuchadnezzar  and  Titus. 


A.  U.  828.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


471 


still  maintained  themselves  in  some  fortresses  of  Judea,  and 
the  defence  of  Machserus  and  Massada  adds  another  brilliant 
gleam  to  the  sunset  of  their  glory.  But  the  final  result  of 
these  operations  was  no  longer  doubtful,  and  the  Roman 
chief  did  not  feel  that  his  presence  was  required  at  them. 
His  cares  were  directed  to  organizing  the  government  of  his 
conquests.  The  residence  of  Titus  at  Berytus,  and  again  at 
Caesarea,  was  marked  by  bloody  shows  in  the  circus,  where  he 
solemnized  the  birthdays  of  his  father  and  brother  with  the 
slaughter  of  multitudes  of  Jewish  captives.  From  thence 
he  returned  to  witness  the  completion  of  his  instructions 
with  regard  to  Jerusalem,  and,  leaving  the  Tenth  legion  in 
garrison  on  the  spot,  carried  with  him  the  Fifth  and  Fif- 
teenth into  Egypt.  His  acceptance  of  the  title  of  Imperator 
from  his  soldiers  was  calculated  to  give  umbrage  to  the  jeal- 
ousy of  the  reigning  emperor,  and  his  indiscretion  in  wear- 
ing the  diadem  in  a religious  ceremony  at  Memphis  was  in- 
terpreted perhaps  by  the  courtiers  to  his  disadvantage : it 
was  remembered,  moreover,  that  his  younger  brother,  with 
far  less  personal  merits,  had  betrayed  too  keen  a zest  for  im- 
perial distinctions.  Titus  was  well  aware  that  his  conduct 
was  liable  to  misconstruction.  Hastening  accord-  Titns  retxlrns 
ingly  to  Rome  as  soon  as  affairs  permitted  him,  J^^p^with 
he  presented  himself  unannounced  in  the  palace,  VesPasian- 
exclaiming,  Here  am  I,  father  ! Vespasian,  with  good  sense 
and  feeling,  requited  him  with  confidence  and  honours,  asso- 
ciating him  in  the  triumph  which  followed,  and  in  the  cares 
and  gratifications  of  empire.1  That  triumph,  earned  with 
more  toil  and  peril  than  any  one  perhaps  of  the  three  hun- 
dred and  twenty  which  had  preceded  it,  has  been  rendered 
memorable  to  posterity  by  monuments  still  existing.2  Even 

1 Suet.  Tit.  5,  6.  This  association  in  the  empire  is  selected  for  the  subject 
of  a special  compliment  by  Silius  {Punic,  iii.  603.).  Dion  remarks  (lxvi.  7.) 
that  neither  Vespasian  nor  Titus  took  the  cognomen  of  Judaicus.  “Obcon- 
temptum  gentis,”  says  Reimar. 

2 The  Christian  historian  Orosius,  in  his  satisfaction  at  the  overthrow  of  the 
Jews,  looks  with  special  favour  on  this  Judaean  triumph:  “Pulchrum  et  igno- 


472 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.D.  70. 


in  the  confusion  of  the  storm  and  the  conflagration,  some  of 
the  choicest  ornaments  of  the  Temple  may  have  been  seized 
and  saved  by  the  conquerors.  Many  of  them  had  perhaps 
been  hidden  by  pious  hands  before  the  last  crisis  of  disaster. 
But  after  the  capture  of  the  city,  certain  priests  emerging 
from  their  hiding-places  had  saved  their  own  lives  by  deliv- 
ering the  treasures  they  had  secreted.  The  sacred  furniture 
of  the  Holy  Place  was  borne  before  the  Imperators  to  the 
Capitol — the  candlestick  with  seven  branches,  the  golden  ta- 
ble, the  trumpets  which  announced  the  year  of  Jubilee,  the 
book  of  the  Law  and  the  Vessel  of  incense.1  When,  some 
years  later,  an  arch  was  erected  to  commemorate  the  victory 
of  Titus,  these  illustrious  trophies  were  sculptured  upon  it, 
with  figures  of  Jewish  captives  surmounted  by  an  emblem 
of  the  victor’s  apotheosis.2  These  witnesses  to  the  truth  of 
the  history  I have  related  are  scanned  at  this  day  by  Chris- 
tians passing  to  and  fro  between  the  Colosseum  and  the 
forum:  and  at  this  day  the  Jew  refuses  to  walk  beneath 
them,  and  creeps  stealthily  by  the  side,  with  downcast  eyes 
or  countenance  averted.3 

turn  antea  cunctis  mortalibus  inter  trecentos  viginti  triumphos,  qui  a eonditione 
Urbis  usque  ad  id  tempus  acti  erant,  hoc  spectaculum  fuit,  patrem  et  filium  uno 
triumphali  curru  vectos,  gloriosissimam  ab  bis,  qui  patrem  et  filium  offenderant, 
victoriam  reportasse.”  Domitian,  says  Suetonius  ( Domit . 2.),  accompanied  the 
triumphal  car,  on  a white  horse ; but  “ black  care  ” sate  doubtless  behind  him. 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  vii.  5.  5.,  compared  with  the  sculptures  on  the  Arch  of 
Titus  at  Rome. 

2 The  Jewish  trophies  are  sculptured  in  bas-relief  on  the  inside  of  the  arch, 
beneath  the  vaulting.  Opposite  to  these  is  another  bas-relief,  representing 
Titus  in  the  quadriga,  the  reins  held  by  the  goddess  Roma.  In  the  centre  of 
the  arch  Titus  is  borne  to  heaven  by  an  eagle.  It  may  be  conjectured  that 
these  ornaments  to  his  glory  were  designed  after  the  death  of  Vespasian,  and 
completed  after  his  own.  Another  monument  of  the  Jewish  triumph  exists  in 
the  medals  of  Vespasian,  bearing  the  figure  of  “Judea  captive”  beneath  the 
palm-tree.  Eckhel,  vi.  326.  For  the  subsequent  history  of  the  Jewish  trophies, 
which  can  be  traced  down  to  the  time  of  Belisarius,  see  Burton’s  Antiquities  of 
Rome , i.  290.,  from  Tillemont,  Empereurs  Romains. 

3 For  this  popular  statement  Burton  refers  to  Madame  de  Stael’s  Corinne, 
chap.  iv.  That  imaginative  writer  does  not  profess  to  give  her  authority,  but 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


473 


The  annexation  of  Palestine  to  the  empire  was  now  finally 
confirmed,  and  the  provinces  given  in  charge  to  an  imperial 
procurator.  Yespasian  founded  no  colony  to  se- 

A n t • Final  annexa- 

cure  his  conquest : he  settled  800  of  his  veterans  tion  of  Paies- 

. t „ T tine  and  con- 

in  the  town  of  hmmaus  seven  miles  from  J erusa-  soiidation  of 
lem,  but  he  assigned  them  no  territorial  possess-  the  empire‘ 
ions.  The  whole  soil  was  confiscated  and  sold  for  the  bene- 
fit of  the  fiscus  to  the  highest  bidder.  A remnant  of  the 
native  population  entered  again,  perhaps,  into  possession  of 
their  estates,  but  at  the  price  of  a tribute  equal  in  amount  to 
the  fee  simple,  with  the  forfeiture  of  their  polity,  and  dissolu- 
tion of  their  chief  bond  of  union.  The  contribution  of  two 
drachmas,  which  every  child  of  Israel  throughout  the  world 
had  hitherto  given  annually  to  the  Temple,  he  was  now 
required  to  transfer  to  the  Capitol.1  With  the  reduction  of 
Palestine  the  consolidation  of  the  empire  was  completed. 
From  the  Mersey  to  the  Dead  Sea  no  nation  remained  erect, 
and  the  resistance  of  the  last  free  men  on  her  frontiers  had 
been  expiated  with  their  blood.  The  overthrow  of  Judea, 
with  all  the  monuments  of  an  ancient  but  still  living  civili- 
zation, was  the  greatest  crime  of  the  conquering  republic. 
It  commenced  in  wanton  aggression,  and  was  effected  with  a 
barbarity  of  which  no  other  example  occurs  in  the  records 
of  civilization.  Jerusalem  shared  the  fate  of  Tarquinii  and 
Corinth ; but  the  Romans,  stalking  among  the  ruins  of  Zion, 
seemed  unconscious  that  they  had  annihilated  a nation  more 
important  in  the  history  of  the  world  than  Etruria,  or  even 
than  Greece.  Yet  not  altogether  annihilated.  The  homeless 
Jews,  scattered,  as  captives  or  fugitives,  more  widely  than 
ever,  bore  throughout  the  empire  and  beyond  it  the  seeds  of 
the  law  delivered  from  Sinai,  the  fortitude  which  neither 

only  remarks  : “ H est  h souhaiter,  pour  l’honneur  des  Juifs,  que  cette  anecdote 
soit  vraie : les  longs  ressouvenirs  conviennent  aux  longs  malheurs.” 

1 Joseph.  Bell.  Jud.  vii.  6.  6.  Dion,  lxvi.  7.,  where  see  Reimar’s  note,  and 
references  to  Suet.  Domit.  12. ; Tertullian,  Apol.  18. ; Appian,  Syriac,  p.  119. ; 
and  Origen,  Opp.  i.  28.  ed.  Ruae. ; showing  how  long  and  how  constantly  this 
exaction  was  maintained. 


474 


HISTORY  OF  THE  ROMANS 


[A.  D.  70. 


Egyptian,  nor  Syrian,  nor  Roman  could  bend  or  break,  the 
hopes  which  delay  had  not  extinguished,  the  maxims  which 
patriarchs  and  prophets  had  revered.  Even  on  the  frontiers 
of  Palestine  the  ancient  voices  were  again  uplifted.  To  the 
temple  of  Jerusalem  succeeded  the  schools  of  Tiberias;  and 
the  influence  of  the  Rabbis  has  in  all  ages  been  felt,  if  not 
always  acknowledged,  by  Christians  and  Mahometans,  by 
the  sages  of  both  the  West  and  East. 

Nor  is  this  all.  The  Temple  fell  in  the  early  days  of  Au- 
gust ; the  exact  date  we  have  not  perhaps  the  means  of  ascer- 
Conciuding  re-  Gaining.  Josephus  indeed,  embracing  the  fond 
marks.  imagination  of  his  countrymen,  was  persuaded 

that  its  final  destruction  occurred  precisely  on  the  day,  the 
10th  of  the  month  Ab,  on  which  it  had  been  once  before 
destroyed  by  the  Assyrians,  being  1130  years,  7 months  and 
15  days  from  its  first  foundation  by  Solomon,  539  years  and 
45  days  from  its  restoration  under  Cyrus.1  But  if  we  may 
indulge  in  the  observation  of  such  coincidences,  none  is  more 
remarkable  than  the  fall  by  fire,  within  eight  months  of  each 
other,  of  the  two  national  temples  of  the  Romans  and  the 
Jews.  We  have  remarked  throughout  this  history  the  close 
political  connexion,  and  at  the  same  time  the  social  distrust 
and  jealousy,  existing  between  these  peoples.  We  have  long 
anticipated  the  decisive  war  which  was  destined  at  last  to 
spring  from  them.  But  we  have  discovered,  at  the  root  of 

1 Joseph,  vi.  4.  8.  Our  author  is  generally  supposed  to  use  the  names  of 
the  Macedonian  months  for  the  Jewish,  which  most  nearly  corresponded  with 
them.  Thus  Lous  represents  Ab,  which  comprises  (normally)  part  of  July  and 
August.  But  as  the  Hebrew  months  are  lunar,  with  a thirteenth  intercalated 
periodically,  the  solar  season  to  which  they  correspond  may  vary  to  the  extent 
of  eleven  days.  The  10th  of  Lous,  therefore,  on  which  the  Temple  was  burnt, 
may  be  at  the  end  of  July  or  early  in  August.  Modern  chronologists  have  cut 
the  knot  by  making  Lous  to  correspond  exactly  with  the  Roman  August,  and 
so  fixing  the  date  in  question  to  August  10.  See  Art  de  Verifier  les  Dates : 
aprks  J.  C.  iv.  188.  Clinton,  more  discreetly,  abstains  from  determining  it. 
Fast.  Hell.  iii.  353.,  Fast.  Rom.  i.  58.  The  Jews  keep  their  annual  fast,  in 
memory  of  the  fall  of  the  Temple,  on  the  9th  of  Ab.  Salvador,  Domin.  Rom. 
en  Judec , ii.  468. 


A.  U.  823.] 


UNDER  THE  EMPIRE. 


475 


this  mutual  repulsion,  so  unnaturally  controlled,  a conflict  of 
ideas  still  more  grave  and  lasting.  Palestine  was  the  cradle 
of  the  Gospel;  the  Jews  the  people  first  appointed  to  ex- 
pound it.  The  destruction,  never  to  he  repaired,  of  their 
material  Temple  cut  the  cords  which  bound  the  New  Faith 
to  its  local  habitation,  and  launched  it,  under  the  hand  of 
Providence,  on  its  career  of  spiritual  conquest;  while  the 
boasted  restoration  of  the  Capitol  was  a vain  attempt  to  re- 
tain hold  of  the  past,  to  revive  the  lost  or  perishing,  to  re- 
attach to  new  conditions  of  thought  an  outworn  creed  of 
antiquity. 


END  OF  THE  SIXTH  VOLUME. 


■ 


* 

- .f!  ! 


> 


Any  of  these  Books  sent  free  "by  mail  to  any  address  on  receipt  of  Price. 


EECENT  PUBLICATIONS 

OP 

D.  APPLETON  & CO., 

443  & 445  BROADWAY,  NEW  YORK 


The  Life  and  Correspondence  of 

THEODORE  PARKER,  Minister  of  the  Twenty-eighth  Congre- 
gational Society,  Boston.  By  John  Weiss.  With  two  Por- 
traits on  Steel,  fac-simile  of  Handwriting,  and  nineteen  Wood 
Engravings.  2 vols.,  8vo.  1,008  pages.  Price,  $6. 

“ These  volumes  contain  an  account  of  Mr.  Parker’s  childhood  and  self- 
education  ; of  the  development  of  his  theological  ideas  : of  his  scholarly  and 
philosophical  pursuits ; and  of  his  relation  to  the  Anti-Slavery  cause,  and  to 
the  epoch  in  America  which  preceded  the  civil  war.  His  two  visits  to  Europe 
are  described  in  letters  and  extracts  from  his  journal.  An  autobiographical 
fragment  is  introduced  in  relation  to  Mr.  Parker’s  early  life,  and  his  letters 
of  friendship  on  literary,  speculative,  and  political  topics  are  freely  inter- 
spersed. The  illustrations  represent  scenes  connected  with  various  periods  of 
Mr.  Parker’s  life,  the  houses  he  dwelt  in,  his  country  haunts,  the  meeting 
house,  his  library,  and  the  Music  Hall  in  which  he  preached.” 


Catechism  of  the  Steam  Engine, 

In  its  various  Applications  to  Minos,  Mills,  Steam  Navigation, 
Railways,  and  Agriculture.  With  Practical  Instructions  for 
the  Manufacture  and  Management  of  Engines  of  every  Class. 
By  John  Bourne,  C.  E.  New  and  Revised  Edition.  1 vol., 
12mo.  Illustrated.  Cloth.  $2. 

“In  offering  to  the  American  public  a reprint  of  a work  on  the  Steam 
Engine  so  deservedly  successful,  and  so  long  considered  standard,  the  Pub- 
lishers have  not  thought  it  necessary  that  it  should  be  an  exact  copy  of  the 
English  edition.  There  were  some  details  in  which  they  thought  it  could  be 
improved  and  better  adapted  to  the  use  of  American  Engineers.  On  this  ac- 
count the  size  of  the  page  has  been  increased  to  a full  12mo.  to  admit  of  larger 
illustrations,  which,  in  the  English  edition,  are  often  on  too  small  a scale,  and 
some  of  the  illustrations  themselves  have  been  supplied  by  others  equally  ap- 

?licable,  more  recent,  and  to  us  more  familiar  examples.  The  first  part  of 
lhapter  XI.,  devoted  in  the  English  edition  to  English  portable  and  fixed 
agricultural  engines,  in  this  edition  gives  place  entirely  to  illustrations  from 
American  practice,  of  steam  engines  as  applied  to  different  purposes,  and  of 
appliances  and  machines  necessary  to  them.  But  with  the  exception  of  some 
of  the  illustrations  and  the  description  of  them,  and  the  correction  of  a few 
typographical  errors,  this  edition  is  a faithful  transcript  of  the  latest  English 
edition.” 


D.  APPLETON  & CO.’S  PUBLICATIONS. 


History  of  the  Romans  under  the 

Empire.  By  Charles  Merivale,  B.  D.,  late  Fellow  of  St.  John’s 
College.  7 vols.,  small  8vo.  Handsomely  printed  on  tinted 
paper.  Price,  in  cloth,  $2  per  vol.  Half  Morocco  extra,  $3  50. 

CONTENTS  : 

Vols.  I.  and  II. — Comprising  the  History  to  the  Fall  of  Julius  Caesar. 

Vol.  HI. — To  the  Establishment  of  the  Monarchy  by  Augustus. 

Vols.  IV.  and  V. — From  Augustus  to  Claudius,  b.  c.  27  to  a.  d.  54. 

Vol.  VI. — From  the  Reign  of  Nero,  a.d.  54,  to  the  Fall  of  Jerusa- 
lem, a.  d.  70. 

Vol.  VII. — From  the  Destruction  of  Jerusalem,  a.  d.  70,  to  the 
Death  of  M.  Aurelius. 

This  valuable  work  terminates  at  the  point  where  the  narrative  of  Gibbon 
commwnces. 

“ When  we  enter  on  a more  searching  criticism  of  the  two 
writers,  it  must  be  admitted  that  Merivale  has  as  firm  a grasp  of  his  subject  as 
Gibbon,  and  that  his  work  is  characterized  by  a greater  freedom  from  preju- 
dice, and  a sounder  philosophy. 

. . . “ This  history  must  always  stand  as  a splendid  monument 

of  his  learning,  his  candor,  and  his  vigorous  grasp  of  intellect.  Though  he 
is  in  some  respects  inferior  to  Macaulay  and  Grote,  he  must  still  be  classed 
with  them,  as  one  of  the  second  great  triumvirate  of  English  historians.”— 
North  American  Review , April , 1863. 


Practice  in  the  Executive  He- 

partment  of  the  Government,  under  the  Pension,  Bounty,  and 
Prize  Laws  of  the  United  States,  with  Forms  and  Instructions 
for  Collecting  Arrears  of  Pay,  Bounty,  and  Prize  Money,  and 
for  Obtaining  Pensions.  By  Robert  Sewell,  Counsellor  at 
Law.  1 vol.,  8 vo.  Sheep.  Price,  $3  50. 

“ I offer  this  little  book  with  confidence  to  the  profession,  as  certain  to 
save  lawyers,  in  one  case,  if  they  never  have  any  more,  more  time  and  trouble 
than  its  cost.  To  the  public  generally,  the  book  is  offered  as  containing  a 
large  amount  of  useful  information-  on  a subject  now,  unfortunately,  brought 
home  to  half  the  families  in  the  land.  To  the  officers  and  soldiers  of  the  Army 
it  will  also  be  found  a useful  companion  ; and  it  is  hoped  that  by  it  an  amount 
of  information  of  great  value  to  the  soldiers,  and  to  their  families  at  home, 
will  be  disseminated,  and  the  prevailing  ignorance  respecting  the  subject 
treated  of  in  a great  degree  removed.”— Extract  from  Preface. 


Hints  to  Riflemen. 

By  H.  W.  S.  Cleveland.  1 vol.,  12mo.  Illustrated,  with  nu- 
merous Designs  of  Rifles  and  Rifle  Practice.  Cloth.  Price,  $1  50. 

v I offer  these  hints  as  the  contribution  of  an  old  sportsman,  and  if  I suc- 
ceed iv  any  degree  in  exciting  an  interest  in  the  subject,  my  end  will  be  ac- 
complished, even  if  the  future  investigations  of  those  who  are  thus  attracted 
should  prove  any  of  my  opinions  to  be  erroneous.” — Extract  from  Preface. 


D.  APPLETON  & CO.’S  PUBLICATIONS. 


Laws  and  Principles  of  Whist, 

Stated  and  Explained,  and  its  Practice  Illustrated  on  an  Original 
System,  by  means  of  hands  played  completely  through.  By 
Cavendish.  Prom  the  fifth  London  edition.  1 vol.,  square 
16mo.  Gilt  edge.  $1  25. 

“An  excellent  and  very  clearly  written  treatise;  the  rules  of  the  game 
thoroughly  explained;  its  practice  illustrated  by  means  of  hands  played  com- 
pletely through,  and  much  of  the  minutije  and  finesse  of  the  game  given  that 
we  have  never  seen  in  any  other  volume  of  the  kind.  Whist  players  will  re- 
cognize it  as  an  authority ; and  that  it  is  a success  is  proved  by  its  having 
already  gone  through  five  editions.  It  is  got  out  very  neatly,  in  blue  and  gold, 
by  the  publishers.” — Com.  Bulletin. 


Roba  di  Roma. 

By  W.  W.  Story.  2 vols.,  12mo.  Cloth,  $3. 

“ Till  Rome  shall  fall,  the  City  of  the  Seven  Hill3  will  he  inexhaustible  as 
a subject  of  interest.  ‘Roba  di  Roma’  contains  the  gatherings  of  an  honest 
observer  and  a real  artist.  ...  It  has  permanent  value  to  entitle  it  to  a 
place  of  honor  on  the  shelf  which  contains  every  lover  of  Italy’s  Rome-books.” 
— Athenaeum. 


Heat  considered  as  a Mode  of 

Motion.  Being  a Course  of  Twelve  Lectures  delivered  at  the 
Royal  Institution  of  Great  Britain.  By  John  Tyndall,  F.R.S. 
Author  of  “ The  Glaciers  of  the  Alps.”  1 vol.,  12mo.  With 
101  illustrations.  Cloth.  $2. 

“ No  one  can  read  Dr.  Tyndall’s  hook  without  being  impressed  with  the 
intensity  of  the  author’s  conviction  of  the  truth  of  the  theory  which  it  is  his 
object  to  illustme,  or  with  the  boldness  with  which  he  confronts  the  difficul- 
ties which  he  encounters.  *******  Dr.  Tyndall’s  is 
the  first  work  in  which  the  undulatory  or  mechanical  theory  of  heat  has  been 
placed  in  a popular  light ; but  we  are  sure  that  no  one,  however  profound  his 
knowledge  upon  the  subject  of  which  it  treats,  will  rise  from  its  perusal  with- 
out a feeling  that  he  has  been  both  gratified  and  instructed  in  a high  degree 
while  reading  its  pages London  Reader. 


Life  of  Edward  Livingston, 

Mayor  of  the  City  of  New  York  ; Member  of  Congress  ; Senator 
of  the  United  States;  Secretary  of  State ; Minister  to  France  ; 
Author  of  a System  of  Penal  Law  for  Louisiana ; Member  of 
the  Institute  of  France,  etc.  By  Charles  H.  Hunt,  with  an 
Introduction  by  George  Bancroft.  1 vol.,  8vo.  Cloth,  $3.50. 

“One  of  the  purest  of  statesmen  and  the  most  genial  of  men,  was 
Edward  Livingston,  whose  career  is  presented  in  this  volume.  * * * * 

[ “ The  author  of  this  volume  has  done  the  country  a service.  He  has  given 

I us  in  a becoming  form  an  appropriate  memorial  of  one  whom  succeeding  gen- 
| erations  will  be  proud  to  name  as  an  American  jurist  and  statesman.” — 

I Evangelist. 

\ 


D APPLETON  & CO.’S  PUBLICATIONS. 


Round  the  Block. 

An  American  Novel.  With  Illustrations.  1 rol.,  12mo.  Cloth. 

Price,  $1  50. 

“The  story  is  remarkably  clever.  It  presents  the  most  vivid  and  various 
pictures  of  men  and  manners  in  the  great  Metropolis.  Unlike  most  novels 
that  now  appear,  it  has  no  ‘mission,’ the  author  being  neither  a politician 
nor  a reformer,  but  a story  teller,  according  to  the  old  pattern,  and  a capital 
story  he  has  produced,  written  in  the  happiest  style,  and  full  of  wit  and  ac- 
tion.. He  evidently  knows  his  ground,  and  moves  over  it  with  the  foot  of  a 
master.  It  is  a work  that  will  be  read  and  admired,  unless  all  love  for  good 
novels  has  departed  from  us ; and  we  know  that  such  is  not  the  case.” — Boston 
Traveler. 


The  History  of  Civilization  in 

England.  By  Henry  Thomas  Buckle.  2 vols.,  8vo.  Cloth.  $6. 

“Whoever  misses  reading  this  book,  will  miss  reading  what  is,  in  various 
respects,  to  the  best  of  our  judgment  and  experience,  the  most  remarkable 
book  of  the  day — one,  indeed,  that  no  thoughtful,  inquiring  mind  would  miss 
reading  for  a good  deal.  Let  the  reader  be  as  averse  as  he  may  to  the  writer’s 
philosophy,  let  him  be  as  devoted  to  the  obstructive  as  Mr.  Buckle  is  to  the 
progress  party,  let  him  be  as  orthodox  in  church  creed  as  the  other  is  hetero- 
dox, as  dogmatic  as  his  author  is  sceptical — let  him,  in  short,  find  his  preju- 
dices shocked  at  every  turn  of  the  argument,  and  all  his  prepossessions  whis- 
tled down  the  wind — still  there  is  so  much  in  this  extraordinary  volume  to 
stimulate  reflection,  and  excite  to  inquiry,  and  provoke  to  earnest  investiga- 
tion, perhaps  (to  this  or  that  reader)  on  a track  hitherto  untrodden,  and 
across  the  virgin  soil  of  untilled  fields,  fresh  woods,  and  pastures  new — that 
we  may  fairly  defy  the  most  hostile  spirit,  the  most  mistrustful  and  least 
sympathetic,  to  read  it  through  without  being  glad  of  having  done  so,  or  hav- 
ing begun  it,  or  even  glanced  at  almost  any  one  of  its  pages,  to  pass  it  away 
unread.” — New  Monthly  (. London ) Magazine. 


Illustrations  of  Universal  Prog- 

ress.  A Series  of  Essays.  By  Herbert  Spencer,  Author  of  “ The 
Principles  of  Psychology;”  “Social  Statics;”  “Education.” 
1 vol.,  12mo.  Cloth,  $1  75. 

“ The  readers  who  have  made  the  acquaintance  of  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer 
through  his  work  on  Education,  and  are  interested  in  his  views  upon  a larger 
range  of  subjects,  will  welcome  this  new  volume  of  ‘ Essays.’  Passing  by 
the  more  scientific  and  philosophical  speculations,  we  may  call  attention  to  a 
group  of  articles  upon  moral  and  political  subjects,  which  are  very  pertinent 
to  the  present  condition  of  affairs.” — Tribune. 


Thirty  Poems. 

By  Wm.  Cullen  Bryant.  1 vol.,  12mo.  Cloth,  $1.25  ; cloth  gilt, 
$1.75  ; mor,,  $3.50. 

“ Ho  English  poet  surpasses  him  in  knowledge  of  nature,  and  but  few  ar® 
his  equals.  Ho  is  better  than  Cowper  and  Thomson  in  their  special  walks  of 
poetry,  and  the  equal  of  Wordsworth,  that  great  high  priest  of  nature.”— 
The  World. 


•V  ■ 


4- 


> 


4 


/ 


■ , 

-•  • • 


4 S { ' 

V 


/ 


PaMPHL!  . 

No.  Case  ./y 


Shelf. 


